-f 


(Copyright  by  Underwood  and  Underwood,  N.   1 
LOOKING  TOWARD  THE  PROMISED   LAND. 


THE    IMMIGRANT 

An  Asset  and  a  Liability 


BY 
FREDERIC   J.  HASKIN 

Author  of 
"The  American  Government" 


ILLUSTRATED 


New  York  Chicago  Toronto 

Fleming    H.  Revell    Company 

London  and  Edinburgh 


Copyright,  1913,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York:  "158*  Fifth  Avenue 

.*/.  :  j^fticagpVizs  &  .-Wabash  Ave. 

*  Toronto":  25  'Richmond  St.,  W. 

London:  21  Paternoster  Square 

Edinburgh:   100  Princes  Street 


This  book  is  a  reproduction  of  a  series  of 
articles  which  were  published  in  a  large  list  of 
newspapers  throughout  the  United  States. 
The  material  was  taken  largely  from  the  ex- 
haustive reports  on  Immigration  made  by  the 
Federal  Government,  augmented  by  the  per- 
sonal observations  of  the  writer  on  immigra- 
tion conditions  at  home  and  abroad.  The 
articles  were  put  in  book  form  to  fill  a  demand 
from  readers  of  The  Haskin  Letter  in  all 
parts  of  the  Union. 


267408- 


CONTENTS 


I. 

Past  Human  Migrations    . 

II 

II. 

Coming  to  America     . 

*9 

III. 

The  "  Old  "  Immigrant 

27 

IV. 

The  "  New  "  Immigrant     . 

34 

V. 

Why  the  Immigrant  Comes 

42    m 

VI. 

Contract  Labour  and  Induced 

Immigration     .... 

50  — 

VII. 

Immigrant  Races 

58 

VIII. 

The  Steerage  Passenger  . 

66 

IX. 

Landing  at  Ellis  Island   . 

74 

X. 

Immigrant  Homes  and  Aid  So- 

cieties       

83- 

XI. 

Distribution  of  Immigrants 

92  - 

XII. 

The    Immigration    Commission's 

Investigation  .... 

100  ^ 

XIII. 

General  Legislation 

108 

XIV. 

The  Alien  in  the  Mine 

US   * 

XV. 

The  Foreigner  in  the  Factory 

123  9m 

XVI. 

The  Foreigner  on  the  Farm 

• 
131 

XVII. 

The  Children  of  Immigrants  in 

School      

139 

XVIII. 

Immigrants  and  Crime 

XIX. 

The  White  Slave  Traffic 
7 

155 

CONTENTS 


XX.  The  Foreigner's  Large  Family 

XXI.  Descendants  of  Immigrants 

XXII.  Padrones  and  Peons 

XXIII.  The  Immigrant  Bank 

XXIV.  Immigrant  Charity  Seekers 
XXV.  Immigrants  from  Asia 

XXVI.  How   the   "New"   Immigrant 

Lives       .... 

XXVII.  Some  Unsolved  Problems 

XXVIII.  The  Problems  of  Other  Coun 

tries      .... 

XXIX.  Emigration  to  Canada   . 

XXX.  Future  Human  Migrations 


163" 

171 

179 

187 

203 

211' 
219^ 

227 

235 
243  /• 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Looking  Toward  the  Promised  Land      Frontispiece 

PAGE 

Slav  Peasants  of  Bosnia 

Polish  and  Slavak  Women  . 

A  Hungarian  Family  .... 

Italian  Girls 


Excluded  Immigrants  About  to  Be  Deported 

from  Ellis  Island      .... 
Roof   Garden    for   Immigrant  Children  at 

Ellis  Island 

Mountain  Women  of  Montenegro 

Roumanians 

A  Finnish  Girl 

Looking   for   More    Liberty  and  a  Better 

Wage  for  the  Sweat  of  Their  Face  . 
A  Greek  Peasant  .... 

Immigrants  Changing  Foreign  Money  into 

American  Currency 
Few  Arabs  Come  to  the  United  States 
Cossacks  from  the  Russian  Steppes    . 
Sicilian  Boys 


19 

34 
42 
58 


66 

74 

92 

100 

123 

131 
179 

187 
203 
219 
243 


I 

PAST  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS 

LONG  before  Joseph  induced  his  brethren 
.to  return  for  their  father  and  bring  him 
up  into  Egypt,  and  long  before  Moses 
afterward  led  them  out  from  under  Egyptian 
bondage,  humanity  was  unceasingly  on  the 
move.  After  Babel  and  its  confusion  of 
tongues  and  the  dispersion  of  humanity,  we 
get  our  next  picture  of  human  wanderings 
from  the  Bible  story  when  Terah  took  Abram 
and  Lot  and  their  wives  and  went  forth  from 
Ur  of  the  Chaldees  to  go  into  the  land  of 
Canaan.  They  got  as  far  as  Haran  and 
Abram's  father,  Terah,  died  there.  Then 
came  the  message  to  Abram  to  "  get  thee  out 
of  thy  country,  and  from  thy  kindred,  and 
from  thy  father's  house,  unto  a  land  that  I  will 
show  thee."  From  this  land  they  travelled  into 
Egypt  and  out  again,  .and  finally  the  posses- 
sions of  Abram  and  Lot  became  so  great  that 
they  could  no  longer  get  along  together.  So 
Abram  said  to  Lot  that  they  would  separate 
and  he  would  give  him  first  choice  of  the  direc- 
11 


12  THE  IMMIGRANT 

tions  they  could  go.  And  Lot  chose  the  plain 
of  Jordan,  while  Abram  chose  Canaan. 

And  so  the  history  of  early  Israel  is  full 
of  the  wanderings  of  the  shepherd  patriarchs, 
their  households,  their  herds,  and  their  flocks. 
Called  forward  by  green  fields  and  pleasant 
watering  places ;  lured  on  by  the  thirst  for  the 
peaceful  conquests  of  unoccupied  lands,  and 
the  martial  conquest  of  alien  peoples,  they 
marched  here  and  there,  both  before  and  after 
the  exodus  from  Egypt.  The  Israelites  were 
a  restless  people,  and  their  constant  seeking  of 
new  lands  to  possess  and  new  opportunities  to 
improve  in  those  days  was  perhaps  no  more 
remarkable  than  the  spirit  of  the  Jew  to-day 
who  is  willing  to  pay  the  price  in  the  coin  of 
suffering  and  isolation  for  getting  on  in  the 
world,  and  for  establishing  a  home  and  a  com- 
petence for  his  children  and  those  who  come 
after  them.  He  willingly  wanders  through  the 
deserts  of  difficulty  and  prejudice  if  he  can  see 
before  him  the  promised  land  of  golden  oppor- 
tunities. And  that  is  why  he  is  the  most  widely 
dispersed  and  yet  the  most  strictly  isolated  of 
all  the  races  of  humanity. 

We  do  not  know  when  man  first  began  his 
career  on  the  earth.  We  only  know  that,  vast 
geologic  ages  ago,  both  the  climate  and  the  out- 
line of  Europe  were  very  different  from  what 


PAST  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS        13 

they  are  to-day,  and  that  man  lived  there  with 
animals  long  since  extinct.  We  do  know  that 
when  the  curtain  first  rose  on  the  stage  of  his- 
tory it  revealed  in  some  favoured  regions,  such 
as  the  valley  of  the  Nile,  nations  and  civiliza- 
tions venerable  with  age  and  possessed  of  lan- 
guages and  arts,  and  institutions  that  bear  evi- 
dence of  thousands  of  years  of  growth  and 
development  before  the  period  of  written  his- 
tory began. 

According  to  the  most  authentic  information 
gathered  by  the  ethnologists,  the  earliest  inhab- 
itants of  Europe  were  of  the  yellow  race, 
which,  broadly  speaking,  not  only  includes  the 
Chinese  and  Japanese,  but  the  Slavic  peoples 
as  well.  They  were  also  the  first  inhabitants 
of  the  New  World.  In  Europe  to-day  live  two 
small  peoples  who  escaped  the  common  fate  of 
an  overwhelming  avalanche  of  civilization  that 
swept  up  behind  them — the  Basques  sheltered 
by  the  Pyrenees,  and  the  Finns  and  Lapps  of 
the  far  North.  The  polished  stone  implements 
found  in  the  caves  and  river  gravels  of  west- 
ern Europe,  the  kitchen-middens  upon  the 
shores  of  the  Baltic,  the  Swiss  like-habita- 
tions, and  the  burial  mounds  all  over  Europe 
confirm  the  belief  that  close  kinsmen  of  the 
Chinese  were  the  first  people  of  Europe.  What 
happened  in  prehistoric  times  in  the  migrations 


14  THE  IMMIGRANT 

of  humanity  into  Europe  has  been  witnessed" 
in  the  coming  of  the  Hungarians  and  the  Turks 
into  Europe. 

Although  the  Aryan  race  is  undoubtedly  the 
youngest  of  the  great  classes  of  humanity,  it 
is,  collectively,  the  most  scattered.  It  includes 
the  ancient  Hindu  and  the  modern  English- 
man; the  ancient  Roman  and  the  modern  Ital- 
ian; the  ancient  Athenian  and  the  modern 
Greek.  Its  descendants  have  peopled  the  New 
World,  Europe,  and  Australia. 

The  original  seat  of  the  Aryan  race  seems 
to  have  been  in  the  Hindu-Kush  mountain  re- 
gion of  northwestern  Asia.  In  the  less  than 
five  thousand  years  that  have  passed  since  the 
first  pilgrims  started  out  of  those  mountain 
valleys  to  conquer  the  world  as  they  progressed, 
they  have  wandered  all  over  the  earth.  Some 
tribes  spread  over  the  tablelands  of  Iran  and 
the  plains  of  India,  and  became  the  progeni- 
tors of  the  Medes,  the  Persians,  and  the  Hin- 
dus. The  tribes  which  entered  Europe  prob- 
ably went  there  by  way  of  the  Hellespont, 
pushing  themselves  down  into  the  peninsulas 
and  founding  the  Greek  and  Roman  states. 
The  vanguard  of  the  tribes  which  swept  across 
middle  Europe  from  Asia  to  the  west  were 
the  Celts.  After  them  came  the  Teutonic 
tribes,  and  the  hard-crowded  Celts  were  forced 


PAST  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS        15 

out  upon  the  westernmost  edge  of  Europe,  into 
Gaul  and  Spain,  and  across  the  Channel  to  the 
British  Isles,  where  they  are  represented  to  this 
day  by  the  Welsh,  the  Irish,  and  the  Highland 
Scots.  Behind  the  Teutons  came  the  Slavs, 
and  they  pressed  up  against  the  Teutons  as 
hard  as  the  Teutons  in  their  first  days  had 
pressed  against  the  Celts. 

From  the  time  when  the  first  venturesome 
tribes  began  to  wander  westward  from  the 
Aryan  cradle-home  until  now,  the  wanderlust 
has  possessed  the  Aryan  peoples,  and  perhaps 
for  four  or  five  thousand  years  they  have  been 
moving  forward  and  westward,  and  the  great 
migration  to  America  is  but  the  continuing  flow 
of  the  stream  that  began  so  many  years  ago. 

We  find  the  history  of  this  Aryan  migration 
written  in  the  earliest  books  of  the  race.  The 
Rig- Veda,  the  most  ancient  of  books,  is  made 
up  chiefly  of  hymns  which  were  composed  by 
the  sweet-singers  of  the  Aryan  clans  which, 
during  a  thousand  years,  marched  steadily 
forward  through  the  Himalayas  and  across 
the  Indian  peninsula  to  the  Ganges.  These 
hymns  are  filled  with  the  memories  of  the  long 
conflict  of  the  fair-faced  Aryans  and  the  dark- 
visaged  aborigines.  They  tell  of  the  terrors 
of  the  mountain  passes,  speaking  often  of  the 
great  dark  mountains  through  whose  gloomy 


16  THE  IMMIGRANT 

defiles  the  early  immigrants  to  India  wended 
their  way. 

The  people  of  eastern  Asia  seem  to  be  the 
only  great  exception  to  the  poetic  statement  that 
"westward  the  course  of  empire  takes  its  way." 
China  was  first  settled  by  a  band  of  Turanian 
emigrants  who  headed  toward  the  rising  in- 
stead of  toward  the  setting  sun,  and  settled  in 
the  basin  of  the  Yellow  River,  there  to  become 
the  progenitors  of  the  most  populous  nation 
human  history  has  ever  known.  They  found 
aborigines  there  just  as  Columbus  found  them 
in  America  and  as  the  Aryans  found  them  in 
India.  Whence  they  came  is  beyond  mortal 
ken.  History  stands  silent  and  dumb,  so  re- 
mote were  the  days  of  their  advent. 

Every  reader  is  familiar  with  the  sweep  of 
the  tides  of  humanity  to  America's  shores  after 
the  discovery  of  the  Western  Hemisphere  by 
Columbus.  But  far  behind  that  date  there 
were  other  races  which  had  come  to  America 
and  which  had  erected  civilizations  of  their 
own — civilizations  whose  few  remaining  ruins 
are  mutely  eloquent  witnesses  of  the  high  order 
of  intelligence  of  the  people.  Perhaps  the 
most  mournful  diary  entry  ever  made  was 
written  by  a  priest  who  accompanied  Cortez 
into  Mexico,  where,  in  the  name  of  religion, 
an  attempt  was  made  to  wipe  even  the  last 


PAST  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS        17 

reminiscence  of  the  Aztec  civilization  from  the 
earth.  He  told  of  their  histories,  their  litera- 
ture, their  medical  science,  their  astronomical 
knowledge,  and  then  related  with  pride  and 
pleasure  the  joy  he  felt  in  seeing  all  their 
sacred  books  of  knowledge  placed  in  a  huge 
bonfire  and  destroyed  beyond  all  hope  of 
resurrection. 

Since  then  centuries  have  come  and  gone, 
and  archaeologists  have  been  able  to  gather  here 
and  there  small  threads  in  the  chain  of  evidence 
as  to  the  nature  of  these  civilizations.  But 
the  calendars  of  the  Aztecs  and  the  Mayas  dis- 
close even  a  greater  knowledge  of  astronomy 
than  Caesar  possessed  when  he  ordained  the 
Julian  calendar,  with  the  aid  of  the  Alexan- 
drian scholars,  and  greater  than  was  at  the  dis- 
posal of  Pope  Gregory  when  he  revised  it. 
But  certain  it  is  that  the  ruins  of  Mitla,  of 
Palenque,  of  Quiragua,  of  Yucatan,  of  Casa 
Grande,  and  of  the  Incas,  tell  of  races  which 
in  their  day  could  match  their  best  contempo- 
raries of  Asia,  Europe,  and  Africa. 

That  the  emigrants  who  laid  the  foundations 
of  these  civilizations  came  from  across  the  seas 
seems  certain.  We  see  the  Toltecs  migrating 
across  the  barren  plains  which  stretch  almost 
from  the  Rio  Grande  to  the  vale  of  Anhuac. 
Then  they  disappear,  legend  says  through  the 


18  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ravages  of  pulque,  and  after  them  come  the 
Chichimec — Mongolian  in  features,  Chinese'  in 
the  forms  of  their  civilization.  Even  to  this 
day  we  may  read  on  the  pyramid  of  the  sun,  be- 
lieved to  have  been  erected  by  them,  the  same 
inscription  one  most  often  finds  upon  the  an- 
cient tombs  of  China — an  inscription  which 
means  "  longevity."  Whence  they  came  or 
how,  there  is  nothing  but  circumstantial  evi- 
dence to  indicate,  but  it  seems  probable  from 
that  evidence  that  it  was  but  a  continuation  of 
the  eastward  movement  of  humanity  that  be- 
gan when  the  Turanians  settled  in  the  valley  of 
the  Yellow  River  and  founded  the  great  empire 
of  China. 

Throughout  hundreds  of  generations  human- 
ity has  thus  been  moving  here  and  there  in 
search  of  the  promised  lands  of  better  oppor- 
tunities, nearly  always  migrating  amid  neces- 
sities and  hardships,  and  often  at  the  risk  of 
life  itself.  Sometimes  it  has  been  the  hand 
of  oppression  and  tyranny  that  has  given  im- 
petus to  the  tide;  at  other  times  it  has  been 
religious  faith;  now  it  has  been  a  question  of 
staying  and  starving  or  of  going  and  enjoying 
plenty.  But  whatever  the  impelling  motive, 
multiplied  millions  of  people  have  traversed 
the  lands  and  the  seas  of  the  earth  in  search 
of  peace,  happiness,  and  contentment. 


(From    National    Geographic    Magazine,    Washington,    D.    C.      Copyright,    1913, 
SLAV    PEASANTS    OF    BOSNIA, 


II 

COMING  TO  AMERICA 

NO  more  important  or  far-reaching  ques- 
tion confronts  the  American  people  to- 
day than  the  problem  of  our  present 
immigration.  Each  year  approximately  a  mil- 
lion aliens — aliens  in  speech,  aliens  in  cus- 
toms, aliens  in  ideals,  though  kindred  in  desire 
for  opportunity  to  better  their  conditions,  kin- 
dred in  craving  for  freedom,  and  kindred  in 
the  possession  of  the  spirit  of  ambition — swarm 
to  our  shores.  Guided  into  proper  channels, 
surrounded  by  proper  influences,  this  alien 
horde  may  be  transformed  into  good  American' 
citizens  and  made  to  constitute  a  great  political 
and  economic  asset  to  the  nation.  Fused  into 
our  national  life  in  the  melting-pot  of  Ameri- 
canization, and  in  the  process  of  leaving  be- 
hind the  dross  of  Old  World  ways,  it  may 
become  part  and  parcel  of  our  body  politic, 
devoted  to  American  traditions,  espousing  our 
ideals,  and  filled  with  our  own  best  aspirations. 
On  the  other  hand,  left  to  form  itself  into 
colonies  which  come  into  contact  only  with  the 
19 


20  THE  IMMIGRANT 

worst  element  of  our  native  population,  re- 
moved from  the  better  influences  of  our  na- 
tional life,  never  learning  our  language,  never 
adopting  our  customs,  never  sensing  our  ideals, 
and  never  catching  the  spirit  of  our  civilization, 
it  might  become  a  permanent  source  of  dan- 
ger to  our  political  well-being  and  a  menace 
to  the  very  life  of  the  nation.  The  character 
of  our  immigration  has  changed.  Formerly 
it  came  from  northwestern  Europe,  and  readily 
fused  itself  into  our  national  life;  to-day  it 
comes  largely  from  southern  and  eastern  Eu- 
rope, and  it  holds  itself  aloof,  preferring  to 
colonize  rather  than  to  be  assimilated. 

How  to  overcome  this  tendency  toward  per- 
manent separation  is  the  great  problem  of 
American  immigration.  It  is  largely  this  phase 
of  the  question  which  occupied  the  attention  of 
the  United  States  Immigration  Commission 
during  its  four  years  of  investigation.  It  will 
probably  constitute  the  subject  of  important 
legislation  during  the  Wilson  administra- 
tion. 

Only  sixty  of  the  ninety-three  millions  of 
our  population  can  boast  of  a  native  parent- 
age. The  remainder  are  foreigners  or  the  chil- 
dren of  foreigners.  The  immigrant  army  is 
received  at  the  rate  of  a  million  a  year,  and 
assuming,  as  Congress  has  assumed,  that  it  re- 


COMING  TO  AMERICA  21 

quires  five  years  to  convert  a  foreigner  into 
an  American,  there  being  sixty  million  native 
Americans,  it  follows  that  every  twelve  natives 
must  convert  one  foreigner  into  an  American. 
It  is  easy  for  twelve  native  American  people 
to  exert  the  Americanizing  influence  on  one 
foreigner  if  they  can  get  at  him,  but  when  he  c 
lives  in  a  colony  aloof  from  them  it  becomes  a 
difficult  task. 

And  under  such  conditions  Americanization 
is  not  taking  place  as  rapidly  as  was  hoped, 
so  far  as  the  immigrant  from  southern  and 
eastern  Europe  is  concerned.    Uncle  Sam  long 
ago  said  that  the  alien  might  become  a  citizen 
in  five  years,  and  the  immigrant  from  north- 
western Europe  usually  goes  after  his  citizen- 
ship papers  as  soon  as  the  time  limit  has  ex- 
pired.    But  not  so  with  the  immigrant  from 
southern  and  eastern  Europe.     Precious  little 
he  cares  about  naturalization  laws.     To  begin  \ 
with,  he  does  not  come  to  America  to  stay.  I 
He  wants  to  make  money  and  then  go  back  | 
home  to  live  in  comparative  affluence.   And  two-  I 
fifths  of  those  who  come  do  go  back  home.    ^ 
They  barely  exist  while  here  and  when  they 
return  home  they  have  money  enough  to  make 
them  Morgans  and  Rockefellers  in  their  native 
villages.    But  of  those  who  stay,  a  surprisingly 
large   number   care    nothing    for   citizenship. 


%%  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Statistics  show  that  fully  a  third  of  those  who 
have  been  here  the  necessary  five  years  fail  to 
take  out  citizenship  papers. 

But,  although  the  immigrant  constitutes  the 
great  American  problem,  he  is  also  a  great 
American  asset.  The  inquiries  of  the  Immi- 
gration Commission  show  what  a  tremendous 
factor  he  is  and  has  been  in  our  industrial  life. 
In  the  iron  and  steel  industries  he  and  his  chil- 
dren contribute  seven-tenths  of  the  labour.  In 
the  slaughtering  and  meat  packing  industry 
they  give  three- fourths  of  the  labour  required. 
They  do  seventy  per  cent  of  the  work  in  the 
bituminous  coal  mines,  and  nearly  three-fifths 
of  that  of  the  glass  factories.  Seven-eighths 
of  the  labour  in  woollen  and  worsted  manufac- 
turing is  contributed  by  the  immigrant  and  his 
children,  and  they  produce  nearly  four-fifths  of 
our  silk  goods,  nearly  nine-tenths  of  the  cotton 
goods,  and  nearly  nineteen-twentieths  of  the 
men's  and  women's  clothing  of  the  country. 
They  make  more  than  half  of  America's  shoes, 
nearly  four-fifths  of  its  furniture.  Half  of 
the  labour  in  making  our  collars,  cuffs,  and 
shirts  is  contributed  by  them,  and  five-sixths 
of  the  work  in  the  leather  industry  is  placed  to 
their  credit.  They  make  half  of  our  gloves, 
refine  nearly  nine-tenths  of  our  oil,  and  nearly 
nineteen-twentieths  of  our  sugar.     Also  they 


COMING  TO  AMERICA  23 

manufacture  nearly  half  of  our  tobacco  and 
cigars. 

There  is  room  for  considerable  speculation 
as  to  what  the  effect  of  the  war  between  the 
Balkan  States  and  Turkey  will  be  on  the  im- 
migration of  the  immediate  future.  During 
the  last  decade  we  received  nearly  half  a  mil- 
lion immigrants  from  the  countries  affected, 
216,000  coming  from  Greece  alone.  Will  the 
decimation  of  the  population  through  the  pres- 
ent war  and  the  expansion  of  the  territory  of 
the  several  countries  through  the  conquest  of 
the  Allies  result  in  a  shifting  of  the  tide  of 
immigration  from  southern  Europe  to  this  new 
field?  One  may  discover  in  the  immigration 
figures  for  the  years  following  the  conclusion 
of  the  several  European  wars  of  the  last  half 
century  a-  falling  off  of  immigration  in  general 
and  of  that  from  affected  territory  in  par- 
ticular. 

But  changes  in  America  have  been  even  more 
influential  than  European  fluctuations  of 
economic  and  other  conditions  upon  the  tide  of 
immigration.  We  may  read  the  story  of  our 
panics  and  our  wars,  of  our  hard  times  and 
our  prosperous  eras,  in  the  rise  and  fall  of  the 
immigrant  tide.  As  a  sunshine  recorder  tells 
of  the  hours  of  sunshine  and  the  hours  of  a 
clouded  sky,  so  the  immigration  figures  tell  the 


24  THE  IMMIGRANT 

story  of  the  bright  days  of  peace  and  pros- 
perity and  the  dark  days  of  panic,  war,  and  in- 
dustrial depression. 

It  was  not  until  after  1840  that  our  immi- 
gration gave  even  a  hint  of  assuming  its  pres- 
ent proportions.  In  that  year  it  was  still  below 
the  hundred  thousand  mark.  But  by  1850, 
beckoned  hither  by  the  great  expansion  of  the 
opening  Middle  West,  its  numbers  were 
swelled  to  369,000  in  a  single  year.  Then  came 
the  panic  of  1857  and  an  era  of  depression  be- 
fore and  after  that  saw  the  figures  fall  from 
427,000  in  1854  to  118,000  in  1859.  It  began 
to  recover  in  i860,  but  in  the  two  years  that 
followed  it  fell  to  a  point  as  low  as  that  of 
the  early  forties.  Then  it  began  to  recover 
again,  and  by  the  end  of  the  war  reached  a 
quarter  of  a  million  annually.  By  1872  it 
passed  the  400,000  mark  again,  but  the  hard 
times  of  the  middle  seventies  forced  the  figures 
down  from  457,000  in  1873  to  138,000  in 
1878.  By  1880  the  stream  had  reached  its 
high  mark  again,  and  then  set  a  new  record  in 
1882,  with  786,000.  Then  it  fell  off  to  338,000 
in  1886,  rising  again  to  623,000  in  1892,  and 
once  more  falling  to  229,000  in  1898.  Then 
it  rose  again  by  leaps  and  bounds  until  it 
touched  the  million-mark  in  1905.  The  panic 
of  1907  forced  it  down  a  half  million,  but  in 


COMING  TO  AMERICA  25 

1910  it  recovered  one-half  of  this  loss.     In 

191 1  it  slipped  back  another  quarter  of  a  mil- 
lion, standing  then  at  878,000. 

All  of  this  proves  that  the  real  impelling 
motive  of  the  immigrant  who  comes  to  America 
is  to  better  his  economic  condition.  Some  say 
it  is  his  love  of  liberty  and  freedom  and  his 
desire  to  escape  oppression  at  home.  But  lib- 
erty and  freedom  were  as  much  with  us  in 
1909,  when  our  immigration  brought  us  only 
751,000  souls,  as  in  1907,  when  it  brought  us 
1,285,000.  Nor  is  there  anything  to  show  that 
the  countries  of  Europe  placed  any  greater 
burdens  upon  the  shoulders  of  their  people 
in  1907  than  in  1909,  or  that  their  eco- 
nomic condition  was  worse  in  1907  than  in 
1909. 

We  know  from  our  own  experience  how 
much  bigger  a  salary  of  a  hundred  dollars  a 
month  looks  to  the  man  in  the  rural  districts 
than  to  his  brother  who  gets  it  in  the  city.  To 
the  former  it  may  appear  to  be  all  that  a  man 
could  reasonably  desire;  to  the  latter  it  does 
not  begin  to  get  him  the  things  he  got  before 
he  came  to  the  city.  When  the  people  of  south- 
ern and  eastern  Europe  hear  of  wages  of  $1.50 
a  day  it  sounds  great.  We  are  told  that  in 
the  Balkan  States  50  per  cent  of  the  people 
suffer  from  want  of  food  in  winter.    Some  see 


26  THE  IMMIGRANT 

here  a  permanent  home,  but  more  see  an  oppor- 
tunity to  gather  together  enough  money  to  go 
back  and  live  in  comparative  affluence  in  the 
land  of  their  birth. 

In  many  an  Italian  village  the  chief  person- 
age is  a  man  who  adventured  into  America 
and  came  home  with  wealth.  It  is  not  in  hu- 
man nature  that  he  should  tell  of  the  privations 
he  suffered  en  route  to  his  El  Dorado,  or  of 
the  submerged  existence  he  led  while  accumu- 
lating those  dollars,  so  few  in  America,  so 
many  in  Italy.  It  is  such  successful  adven- 
turers as  he  that  kindle  the  spirit  of  the 
Argonauts  in  the  breasts  of  young  men  in 
southern  and  eastern  Europe. 


Ill 

THE  "OLD"  IMMIGRANT 

NOTHING  is  more  significant  in  the  his- 
tory of  immigration  to  America  than 
the  change  in  the  character  of  the 
stream  of  humanity  that  is  coming  to  our 
shores.  The  bulk  of  immigration  always  has 
come  from  Europe,  for  to  date  nearly  ninety- 
three  out  of  every  hundred  immigrants  arriv- 
ing have  come  from  that  one  continent.  Prior 
to  1883  nineteen-twentieths  of  all  our  immigra- 
tion from  Europe  came  from  the  United  King- 
dom, Germany,  Scandinavia,  The  Netherlands, 
Belgium,  France,  and  Switzerland.  As  re- 
cently as  1883,  only  a  little  more  than  one- 
eighth  of  the  European  immigration  came 
from  eastern  and  southern  Europe.  To-day 
the  immigration  from  that  section  has  grown 
until  it  embraces  more  than  four- fifths  of  all 
those  who  come.  Meanwhile  the  countries 
which  gave  us  our  rich  influx  of  home-builders 
prior  to  1883  are  not  sending  us  many  immi- 
grants to-day. 

The  old  immigration  differed  from  the  new 
27 


28  THE  IMMIGRANT 

in  many  essentials.  The  former  was  largely 
a  migration  of  people  who  came  to  become  citi- 
zens, to  acquire  homes  here,  and  to  establish 
their  posterity  upon  the  land.  They  entered 
practically  every  line  of  activity  in  every  part 
of  the  country.  A  large  proportion  of  them 
were  engaged  in  agriculture  before  they  came 
and  they  went  out  as  farm-labourers  when  they 
got  here.  But  they  were  frugal  and  the  la- 
bourer of  yesterday  became  the  farmer  of 
to-day.  They  formed  a  very  important  factor 
in  the  development  of  all  the  territory  west 
of  the  Allegheny  Mountains.  So  rapid  was  the 
process  of  assimilation  that  the  racial  identity 
of  their  children  was  almost  lost  and  for- 
gotten. 

The  extent  of  the  decline  of  immigration 
from  northern  Europe  is  emphasized  by  the 
results  in  various  countries.  Germany  gave  us 
eight  times  as  many  immigrants  in  1883  as  *n 
191 1.  Ireland  gave  us  76,000  of  her  people 
in  1883  and  only  29,000  in  191 1.  Sweden's 
contribution  to  our  immigrant  population  fell 
from  64,000  in  1883  to  20,000  in  191 1,  and 
Switzerland's  from  10,000  to  3,500. 

As  stated  before,  the  people  who  come  from 
northwestern  Europe  come  to  stay.  Among 
them  only  sixteen  out  of  every  hundred  go 
back  to  their  homes  in  Europe,  while  thirty- 


THE  "  OLD  "  IMMIGRANT  29 

eight  out  of  every  hundred  from  southern  and 
eastern  Europe  return.  The  "  old  "  immigra- 
tion comes  with  its  families,  for  more  than  two- 
fifths  are  females.  The  "  new  "  immigration 
leaves  the  women  folk  behind,  for  only  a  little 
more  than  one-fourth  of  the  arrivals  are  fe- 
males. 

The  better  condition  of  the  immigrant  from 
northwestern  Europe,  as  compared  with  his 
more  unfortunate  brother  in  other  parts  of  the 
continent,  is  revealed  by  the  money  they  were 
able  to  show.  The  average  "  old  "  immigrant 
can  exhibit  forty  dollars  to  the  immigration 
inspector.  The  average  "  new "  immigrant 
has  about  sixteen  dollars  when  he  lands.  The 
educational  advantages  of  the  "  old  "  immi- 
grant are  even  more  marked.  There  are  more 
than  thirteen  times  as  many  illiterates  coming 
to  us  from  the  "  new  "  immigration  as  from 
the  "  old."  The  "  old  "  immigration  measures 
up  to  all  the  usual  tests  of  good  citizenship  in 
about  the  same  ratio,  when  compared  with  the 
"  new."  And  yet  all  authorities  agree  that  in 
the  "  new  "  immigrant  we  have,  as  a  rule,  a 
diamond  in  the  rough,  a  human  being  who  is 
just  as  capable  of  transformation  into  a  good 
citizen  as  his  more  fortunate  brother  from 
northwestern  Europe.  The  process  is  simply 
a  longer  and  more  tedious  one,  and  one  to 


4 


30  THE  IMMIGRANT 

which  the  immigrant  does  not  lend  himself  as 
readily. 

Northwestern  Europe  has  responded  faith- 
fully to  our  demand  for  people  to  fill  our  lands 
and  become  a  part  of  the  bone  and  sinew 
of  our  country.  It  has  in  ninety-two  years 
given  us  nearly  seventeen  million  immigrants. 
Draw  a  line  through  Grand  Forks,  Sioux  City, 
Omaha,  Kansas  City,  and  Hot  Springs,  and 
thence  down  the  Louisiana-Texas  boundary  to 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  the  entire  population 
west  thereof  is  no  greater  than  that  contributed 
to  us  by  northwestern  Europe. 

Germany  has  given  us  more  immigrants  than 
any  other  country,  with  the  single  exception  of 
Great  Britain.  Nearly  five  million  Germans 
have  come  across  the  water  to  become  a  part 
of  this  nation.  The  pioneers  of  the  great  Ger- 
man migration  were  the  Mennonites,  who  in 
1682  followed  the  path  of  the  English  Quak- 
ers. They  were  the  first  people  in  America  to 
petition  the  abolition  of  slavery.  They  also 
were  the  first  people  in  America  to  raise  their 
voice  against  intemperance.  They  were  soon 
followed  by  the  Scandinavians,  of  whom  it  has 
been  said  that  there  is  no  second  generation, 
since  the  children  become  so  thoroughly  Ameri- 
cans. 

The  coming  of  the  "  new  "  immigration  has 


THE  "  OLD  "  IMMIGRANT  31 

caused  the  members  of  the  "  old  "  to  move  out 
of  their  vocations  and  residential  quarters  and 
on  up  into  a  higher  sphere.  Where  once  the 
Irish,  the  German,  and  the  Scandinavian 
worked  and  lived,  now  the  Greek,  the  Italian, 
the  Pole,  the  Bohemian,  the  Austrian,  and  the 
Russian  Jew  are  found.  The  German,  the 
Irishman,  the  Swede,  and  the  Norwegian  have 
moved  into  better  quarters  and  have  taken  up 
more  attractive  work. 

The  immigrant  from  northwestern  Europe 
quickly  becomes  a  citizen.  More  than  nine- 
tenths  of  the  Swedes  and  the  Swiss  entitled 
to  citizenship  papers  have  them,  approximately 
seven-eighths  of  the  Germans,  Welsh,  Danes, 
and  Norwegians  have  taken  them  out,  and 
four-fifths  of  the  Irish,  English,  Scotch,  and 
Dutch  have  cast  their  lot  permanently  with  us. 
Compare  this  with  the  Allies  in  the  Balkan- 
Turkish  War,  and  the  remarkable  difference 
in  the  character  of  the  aspirations  of  the  two 
types  of  immigration  will  appear.  Only  one- 
eighth  of  the  Servian  immigrants  have  taken 
out  citizenship  papers,  one-fifth  of  the  Greeks, 
and  a  little  more  than  a  third  of  the  Bulgarians. 
Seven-tenths  of  the  southern  Italians  hold  aloof 
from  citizenship. 

When  will  our  affairs  reach  that  situation 
where  there  is  an  economic  balance  and  an 


32  THE  IMMIGRANT 

end  to  immigration  to  the  United  States  ?  The 
late  Professor  W.  J.  McGee  once  declared  that 
the  soil  of  the  United  States  has  a  sustaining 
power  of  500  to  the  square  mile.  Assuming 
that  one-third  of  our  territory  is  waste  land, 
we  still,  upon  this  basis,  would  have  room  for 
a  round  billion  of  people.  Dr.  McGee  esti- 
mated that  in  three  centuries  we  can  reasonably 
hope  to  approach  that  number.  But  to  reach 
that  high  population  we  would  have  to  make 
heavier  drafts  upon  Europe  than  Europe  could 
bear.  Assuming  that  we  would  need  propor- 
tionately as  many  immigrants  to  expand  from 
our  present  population  to  the  billion  mark  as 
we  needed  to  reach  our  present  population,  we 
would  have  to  draw  a  draft  upon  Europe  for 
300,000,000  souls — a  million  every  year  for< 
three  centuries.  And  when  we  consider  that  in 
two  generations  the  foreigner — both  of  the 
old  immigration  and  of  the  new — becomes  so 
thoroughly  Americanized  that  he  follows  the 
tendency  of  the  native  American  toward  race 
suicide,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  small-family 
"inclinations  of  Americans  will  prevent  as  heavy 
contributions  to  the  swelling  population  as  "  a 
billion  in  three  centuries  "  would  call  for. 

Many  economists  think  the  immigration 
from  northwestern  Europe  has  settled  down  to 
a  basis  that  is  about  normal,  and  that  we  hence- 


THE  "  OLD  "  IMMIGRANT  33 

forth  may  count  upon  receiving  about  a  quar- 
ter of  a  million  of  them  during  the  average 
year.  But  there  are  others  who  say  that  the 
disappearance  of  cheap  farming  land  and  the 
filling  of  the  factories  with  cheap  labour  from 
southern  Europe  will  cut  down  the  figures 
probably  to  half  their  present  proportions. 
They  believe  that  Germany  is  about  the  best 
example  of  what  we  may  expect  of  the  "  old  " 
immigration  in  the  future;  and  Germany  now 
gives  us  only  one-eighth  as  many  of  her  good 
citizens  in  a  year  as  she  did  thirty  years  ago. 
All  students  of  the  immigration  problem 
agree  that  the  passing  of  the  "  old  "  immigra- 
tion accentuates  the  problems  of  the  "  new," 
and  since  it  is  becoming  the  latter  or  nothing, 
it  behooves  the  nation  to  try  to  make  the  most 
of  it,  and  to  aid  it  to  fill  the  place  in  future  that 
the  "  old  "  has  filled  in  the  past,  a  The  consefvM 
sus  of  opinion  is  that  this  is  not  so  much  a  mat-  \ 
ter  of  the  restriction  of  immigration  as  it  is  \ 
of  Americanizing  the  immigrants.. 


IV 

THE  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANT 

SINCE  three  out  of  every  four  of  our  pres- 
ent-day immigrants  come  from  countries 
where  public  education  is  unheard  of, 
where  popular  participation  in  the  affairs  of  the 
government  is  undreamed  of,  where  dire  pov- 
erty is  the  rule,  it  is  apparent  that  the  immigra- 
tion problem  is  a  grave  one.  And  then,  when 
we  consider  that  two-thirds  of  this  "  new " 
immigration  comes  from  the  rural  village  and 
is  dumped  out  upon  our  big  centres  of  popu- 
lation, where  vice  surrounds  it  and  fattens  upon 
it,  where  it  feels  all  of  the  worst  effects  of  our 
civilization  and  none  of  its  better  effects,  the 
wonder  grows  that  the  problem  is  not  more 
serious  than  it  is. 

But  that  it  is  a  problem  serious  enough  as  it 
stands  is  recognized  by  all  who  have  studied 
our  immigration.  While  the  "  new  "  immi- 
grant, with  his  willingness  to  work  in  the  dirt 
and  the  filth  and  the  danger  that  are  a  con- 
comitant, has  made  possible  much  of  America's 
splendid  industrial  development,  the  very  fact 
84 


THE  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANT         35 

of  his  willingness  to  brave  these  things  and  to 
brave  them  at  scant  wages,  has  made  him  a 
£s  liability  to  the  nation.  The  man  who  will  do 
these  things  is  necessary  to  the  industrial  life 
of  a  nation;  but  the  man  who  is  content  to  do 
them  and  never  to  look  up  and  beyond  them 
may  be  a  menace.  If  they  come  to  America 
and  start  at  the  bottom  of  the  ladder  and 
gradually  work  up  to  better  things,  as  the 
members  of  the  "  old  "  immigration  have  done, 
it  augurs  well  for  the  future,  and  one  of  the 
most  serious  problems  of  the  immigration  situ 
ation  is  solved.  But  if  they  are  content  to 
live  their  own  lives  away  and  to  commit  their 
children  to  similar  lives,  it  is  evident  that  their 
assimilation  must  be  uncertain  and  their  value 
to  the  body  politic  a  doubtful  thing. 

The  economic  distress  that  led  the  pioneers 
of  the  southern  and  eastern  European  countries 
to  migrate  was  pressing.  The  average  earning 
of  a  Slovak,  for  instance,  during  the  harvest 
season  was  twenty-five  cents  a  day,  and  in  other 
seasons  he  was  fortunate  to  get  half  that  much, 
for  work  was  as  scarce  as  wages  were  low.  If 
a  load  of  wood  were  brought  to  town  dozens 
would  apply  for  the  job  of  sawing  it.  A 
strong,  muscular  servant-girl  who  could  scrub 
and  wash,  attend  to  the  garden,  and  look  after 
the  cattle  and  sheep,  besides  helping  with  the 


36  THE  IMMIGRANT 

harvest,  might  get  ten  dollars  a  year  with  a 
big  cake  and  a  pair  of  shoes  thrown  in.  Hard 
rye  bread  and  an  onion  constituted  the  daily 
diet.  Edward  Steiner,  himself  an  immigrant, 
and  now  one  of  the  greatest  of  our  authorities 
on  immigration,  tells  of  seeing  a  pig  die  of 
disease  and  being  buried.  According  to  law 
it  was  covered  with  quicklime  and  coal  oil. 
Hardly  had  the  burial  been  completed  when 
the  carcass  mysteriously  disappeared — for  the 
peasants  were  hungry  and  meat  was  scarce. 

And  so  it  has  been  everywhere.  Once  the 
tide  starts  in  a  given  country  it  keeps  up,  grow- 
ing larger  as  it  comes.  A  few  Joshuas  and 
Calebs  travel  to  this  new  Canaan  and  then  write 
back  telling  of  the  milk  and  honey  they  find 
here,  or  else  they  go  back  with  the  grapes  of 
American  gold,  and  after  that  the  trail  needs 
no  blazing. 

The  rise  of  the  "  new  "  immigration  is  as 
remarkable  as  the  decline  of  the  "  old."  Thirty 
years  ago  there  were  less  than  30,000  Aus- 
tro-Hungarians  coming  to  America  annually; 
to-day  the  annual  arrivals  total  about  200,- 
000  a  year.  Thirty  years  ago  126  Greeks 
came  to  America  as  immigrants;  last  year  26,- 
000  came.  Italy's  contribution  to  our  popula- 
tion was  six  times  as  great  in  19 11  as  in  1882, 
Russia's  ten  times  as  great,  while  Turkey  sent 


THE  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANT         37 

us   19,000  in  191 1  as  compared  with  69  in 
1882. 

The  attitude  of  the  governments  affected  by 
the  "  new  "  immigration  depends  largely  upon 
the  degree  of  its  permanence  in  America. 
Italy,  for  instance,  is  very  glad  to  see  its  peo- 
ple come  over,  because  they  have  demonstrated 
that  they  not  only  can  come  back,  but  do  come 
back.  In  a  recent  investigation  made  by  the 
Italian  government  into  conditions  in  Sicily, 
the  beneficial  effect  of  the  returning  of  the 
emigrant  was  declared  in  the  strongest  terms. 
It  was  said  that  greater  than  the  benefit  of  any 
laws  the  government  could  pass,  better  than 
any  training  the  government  could  give,  were 
the  benefits  conferred  upon  the  community  by 
the  returning  emigrant.  Not  merely  did  he 
bring  new  wealth,  a  thing  the  community 
badly  needed,  but  what  was  much  more  im- 
portant, he  brought  with  him  the  American 
spirit  of  intelligent  enterprise  which  did  much 
for  his  community.  In  short,  the  report  in- 
dicates that  the  returned  emigrant  helps  his 
community  in  Italy  about  as  much  as  an  agri- 
cultural school  graduate  helps  the  farmers  of 
his  community  in  America. 

And  so  it  is  proving  throughout  southern  1 
and  eastern  Europe.    The  returning  immigrant 
is  carrying  back  American  money,  and  along 


I 


38  THE  IMMIGRANT 

with  it  American  thought  and  American  cus- 
toms. Scarcely  a  village  there  is  now  without 
its  returned  immigrants.  They  bring  Ameri- 
can phonographs,  American  collars  and  ties, 
American  taste  for  modern  clothes.  It  is  no 
novelty  even  in  the  remote  mountain  villages  to 
hear  an  American  talking-machine  screeching 
American  ragtime. 

In  every  country  the  returning  immigrant 
is  somebody  in  his  little  community.  He  has 
made  as  much  in  America  in  a  week  as  he 
made  at  home  in  several  months,  and  his  sav- 
ings of  a  thousand  dollars  make  him  a  nabob. 
The  people  believe  his  stories  of  American 
genius  and  achievement  until  he  gets  to  tell- 
ing about  a  forty-story  building,  and  then  their 
faith  breaks  down.  They  can  believe  that  the 
Americans  have  a  machine  into  which  one  can 
feed  iron  and  wood  and  a  wagon  comes  out 
of  it  finished;  they  can  even  believe  that  we 
have  machines  which  will  cut  wheat,  thresh  it, 
grind  the  flour,  and  then  make  bread  or  cake 
out  of  it  according  to  which  button  is  pushed; 
but  when  it  comes  to  a  forty-story  building, 
that  is  impossible. 

The  pitiful  thing  about  the  "  new  "  immi- 
grant is  the  fact  that  he  usually  hails  from  a 
rural  village,  where  he  worked  on  the  farms 
and  in  the  vineyards  or  herded  sheep.    Land- 


THE  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANT         39 

ing  in  a  big  city,  he  is  immediately  beset  by 
those  who  would  exploit  him.  Off  he  goes  to 
some  industrial  centre  where  he  must  live  in 
'places  scarcely  fit  for  human  habitation, 
crowded  with  a  dozen  others  in  a  shack  scarce 
big  enough  for  two.  The  work  he  finds  is 
either  filthy  or  dangerous.  He  goes  into  the 
bituminous  coal  mine,  into  the  fertilizer  fac- 
tory, into  the  wood-working  plant,  into  the 
slaughter  house — everywhere  that  there  is 
work  too  disagreeable  or  dangerous  for  the 
native  American  workingman. 

The  toll  that  is  taken  from  these  immigrants 
is  fearful.  With  few  women  among  them  to 
cast  a  refining  influence  over  them,  they  spend 
their  time  between  working  and  drinking,  as 
a  rule,  and  saving  what  they  can,  with  the  day 
in  view  when  they  can  return  to  their  native 
land.  In  the  vast  majority  of  cases  their  con- 
dition for  the  time  being  is  worse  in  America 
than  it  was  in  their  native  lands.  But  they 
sacrifice  themselves  to-day  in  America  in  order 
that  to-morrow  at  home  they  may  live  in  com- 
fort. If  they  lived  according  to  American 
standards  their  wages  would  barely  suffice  to 
keep  them  going.  But  they  will  half  starve 
themselves  and  live  in  the  worst  of  surround- 
ings for  the  sake  of  going  back  home  some 
day. 


THETM] 


40  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Where  the  women  come  along  they  usually 
keep  boarding-houses,  and  their  husbands  com- 
pel them  to  do  so  as  long  as  the  wives  are  yet 
without  the  American  spirit.  But  manyVthe 
time  when  there  has  been  a  Declaration  of 
Independence  proclaimed  in  one  of  these  board- 
ing-houses when  the  wife  concluded  no  longer 
to  play  slave  to  her  lord.  The  Slav  has  none 
of  our  consideration  for  his  wife.  He  has 
a  proverb  that  he  is  happy  twice  in  his  life; 
once  when  he  marries  and  once  when  he  buries 
his  wife.  His  wife  sings,  "  Love  me  true,  and 
love  me  quick,  pull  my  hair  and  use  the  stick." 
The  Montenegrin  says  his  wife  is  his  mule. 
The  Greek  and  the  Italian,  the  Austrian  and 
the  Magyar  treat  their  wives  much  better. 

Three- fourths  of  all  the  "  new  "  immigra- 
tion is  made  up  of  men  and  boys.  The  Balkan 
States  send  only  one  woman  to  twenty-five 
men,  and  the  same  ratio  exists  with  the  Greeks. 
The  ones  who  have  womenfolk  with  them  usu- 
ally stay;  most  of  the  bachelors  return.  More 
than  half  the  Croatians,  Italians,  Slovaks,  and 
Magyars  return  to  their  native  homes,  and  in- 
quiries show  that  perhaps  two-thirds  of  all 
who  go  never  return  again. 

Among  those  who  help  to  cut  down  the  hig'i 
percentage  of  returning  immigrants  are  t  . 
Jews  of  eastern  Europe.    They  come  over 


KlGR^ 


THE  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANT         41 

great  numbers  and  precious  few  of  them  ever 
go  back.  They  correspond  to  our  "  old  "  im- 
migration in  their  desire  to  make  America  their 
home.  The  immigrant  who  returns  takes  his 
money  with  him;  but  he  has  left  much  more 
than  value  received  when  he  does  so.  The 
entire  list  of  Italians  who  build  a  tunnel  under 
the  Hudson  River  might  trek  back  to  Europe 
with  their  savings,  but  the  benefit  of  that  tun- 
nel will  continue  throughout  the  years.  With- 
out their  labour  the  mighty  works  of  which  \ 
we  Americans  boast  so  pride  fully  could  not 
have  been  accomplished. 

The  comforting  thought  about  the  "  new  " 
immigration  is  that  it  has  not  much  to  unlearn. 
It  is  often  easier  to  build  a  new  house  than 
to  remodel  an  old  one,  and  likewise  it  might 
be  easier  to  make  a  good  citizen  of  an  illiterate 
villager  from  the  lands  of  the  Slovaks,  the 
Italians,  and  the  Finns  than  of  their  better 
educated  brethren  who  must  first  unlearn  some 
fixed  notions. 


V 

WHY  THE  IMMIGRANT  COMES 

ONE  needs  look  no  further  than  the 
statistics  of  the  ebb  and  flow  of  the 
immigrant  tide  to  discover  that  the  real 
basis  of  American  immigration  is  more  eco- 
nomic than  idealistic.  At  all  times  in  our  his- 
tory immigrants  have  come  to  America  seeking 
an  asylum  from  persecution  of  one  kind  or 
another — political  or  religious.  But  the  vast 
majority  have  come  because  they  thought 
America  offered  better  opportunities  to  get 
on  in  the  world.  With  the  returning  alien 
of  the  "  new  "  immigration  this  is  patent,  but 
it  is  no  less  true  of  the  one  who  comes  and 
stays,  else  why  should  the  tide  rise  so  high  in 
fat  years  and  fall  so  low  in  lean  ones  ? 

It  always  has  required  some  period  of  un- 
usual economic  distress  or  of  religious  perse- 
cution to  start  an  important  movement  of  im- 
migrants to  the  United  States.  It  was  the 
Irish  potato  famine  that  caused  Irish  immigra- 
tion to  double  in  a  single  year  and  to  be  multi- 
plied five  times  in  as  many  years.  In  the  mid- 
42 


WHY  THE  IMMIGRANT  COMES      43 

die  forties  conditions  in  Germany  began  to 
swell  the  immigrant  tide,  and  in  eight  years  the 
number  of  our  German  immigrants  increased 
sevenfold. 

But,  as  a  rule,  especially  in  the  case  of  the 
"  new  "  immigration,  the  number  coming  from 
any  one  country  is  very  small  at  first.  In  1870 
only  twenty  Greeks  were  welcomed  to  our 
shores.  Not  until  1890  did  the  Greek  arrivals 
reach  the  thousand  mark.  But  during  the  suc- 
ceeding twenty  years  the  stream  continued  to 
grow  until  in  19 10  it  was  more  than  a  thou- 
sandfold greater  than  in  1870,  and  more  than 
twenty  times  as  great  as  in  1890.  In  1870 
fewer  than  three  thousand  Italians  came  to 
America.  But  the  Italian  immigration  had  in- 
creased to  twelve  thousand  a  year  by  1880,  fifty 
thousand  a  year  by  1890,  a  hundred  thousand 
a  year  by  1900,  and  to  nearly  a  quarter  of 
a  million  by  19 10.  Austria-Hungary  gave  us 
less  than  five  thousand  immigrants  in  1870 
and  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  in  1910. 
The  Russian  immigrant  wave  had  barely 
started  in  1870,  and  yet  it  has  brought  us  nearly 
three  million  souls  since  then,  while  Austria- 
Hungary  and  Italy  have  each  sent  us  more  than 
three  million  in  that  time. 

All  European  countries  except  Russia  and 
Turkey  recognize  the  right  of  their  people  to 


4*  THE  IMMIGRANT 

come  to  America.  Under  the  laws  of  Russia, 
citizens  are  forbidden  to  leave  the  country  for 
a  permanent  residence  elsewhere,  but  the  fact 
that  upward  of  three  million  of  them  have  come 
to  America  in  forty  years  demonstrates  that 
even  a  despotic  nation  cannot  stay  the  irresist- 
ible wanderlust  of  humanity  when  economic 
necessity  forces  it  to  move  on.  Turkey  has  the 
same  sort  of  law,  but  it  also  is  more  honoured 
in  its  breach  than  in  its  keeping.  When  north- 
ern Europe  bids  farewell  to  its  immigrants  it 
knows  that  when  once  they  reach  their  Ameri- 
can port  of  entry  they  are  lost  to  Europe  for- 
ever. But  with  southern  and  eastern  Europe 
it  is  different.  Here  the  emigration  of  their 
people  to  America  is  looked  upon  as  more  in 
the  nature  of  a  movement  of  transient  indus- 
trial workers,  a  fair  percentage  of  whom  will 
return.  It  is  felt  that  the  ones  who  return, 
plus  the  money  and  the  experience  they  bring 
back,  are  worth  more  than  the  larger  number 
who  went  out. 

The  present-day  immigration  embraces  a 
comparatively  small  proportion  of  inhabitants 
of  the  larger  cities.  Only  the  Russian  Jews 
form  an  exception  to  this  rule,  but  that  arises 
from  the  fact  that  they  are  compelled  to  live 
in  the  cities.  The  immigrant  usually  comes, 
not  because  he  is  unable  to  make  a  living  at 


WHY  THE  IMMIGRANT  COMES      45 

home — for  the  possession  of  enough  money  to 
get  here  argues  his  ability  to  live  at  home — but 
in  the  hope  of  making  a  better  living  than  is 
possible  at  home.  He  is  simply  a  man  with 
labour  to  sell  and  he  sees  a  much  higher  price 
for  it  in  America. 

The  direct  causes  of  our  immigration  to-day 
are  the  letter  writer  and  the  returning  immi- 
grant. It  is  from  them  that  the  European 
peasant  hears  of  this  great  land  of  high  wages 
across  the  seas.  Their  messages  tell  of  pros- 
perity, of  earning  as  much  in  a  day,  often,  as 
the  peasant  earns  in  a  week.  There  is  scarcely 
a  village  in  all  southern  and  eastern  Europe 
which  has  not  contributed  its  share  to  the  im- 
migrant tide,  and,  in  fact,  scarcely  a  man  or 
woman  who  has  not  a  father,  a  brother,  an 
uncle,  or  a  cousin  over  here  in  America  or 
who  has  been  here.  Thirty  million  dollars  a 
year  is  sent  back  in  American  money  orders 
as  mute  but  indisputable  witness  of  financial 
success  in  America.  The  whole  neighbour- 
hood hears  about  it  when  a  money  order  ar- 
rives. For  instance,  when  the  Italian  saves  a 
hundred  dollars  and  sends  it  home — that's  five 
hundred  lire  in  Italy,  and  five  hundred  lire 
buys  a  home.  If  some  one  sent  you  enough 
money  from  across  the  seas  to  buy  a  nice  little 
bungalow,  wouldn't  your  friends  soon  know 


*  1 


46  THE  IMMIGRANT 

about  it?  And  if  your  brother  were  to  go  to 
South  America  and  send  enough  money  back  to 
his  parents  in  a  single  year  to  buy  a  home,  and 
with  it  a  letter  saying  that  other  members  of  the 
family  could  do  just  as  well  and  that  he  had 
places  for  them  all,  wouldn't  you  want  to  go  ? 
Well,  that's  exactly  what  happens  when  the 
u  new "  immigrant  sends  his  money  orders 
home. 

In  many  cases  a  proud  father  and  mother, 
when  they  receive  such  letters,  pass  them  from 
hand  to  hand  and  let  all  their  neighbours 
see  the  great  prosperity  of  their  son,  until 
the  whole  community  knows  of  his  success  in 
America.  And  there  is  one  class  that  this 
news  particularly  appeals  to — the  boys  with 
budding  ambition.  They  are  as  eager  to  try 
their  luck  in  America  as  is  the  American 
country  boy  to  go  to  the  city. 

These  letters  tell  little  of  the  hardships  and 
the  privations  endured  to  make  saving  possible. 
Come  closer  home.  A  country  boy  whose  par- 
ents stand  well  in  his  community — his  father 
an  elder  in  the  church,  a  justice  of  the  peace, 
or  a  school  trustee — goes  to  the  city.  At  home 
the  boy  goes  with  the  best  people  of  his  com- 
munity, has  his  own  horse  and  buggy,  and  is 
otherwise  well  fixed;  but  when  he  gets  to  the 
city  and  becomes  a  street  car  conductor  or  a 


WHY  THE  IMMIGRANT  COMES      47 

factory  hand,  do  you  suppose  that  his  pride  will 
let  him  tell  of  the  little  hall-room  he  sleeps  in, 
of  the  cheap  food  he  must  live  on,  of  the  doors 
that  are  closed  against  him  socially?  No,  he 
works  on,  hoping  eventually  to  climb  the  ladder 
high  enough  to  command  in  town  the  things  he 
gave  up  when  he  left  home. 

So  it  is  with  the  new  immigrant — at  best  it 
is  hard  to  give  up  the  life  of  the  little  village 
with  its  adjacent  poppy  fields,  its  friendships, 
and  all  that,  but  when  the  immigrant  arrives 
and  gets  to  work,  rinding  himself  "  only  a 
Dago  "  or  "  only  a  Hunkey  "  in  the  eyes  of  the 
native  American,  fit  only  to  be  cursed  and 
cuffed  about,  handled  in  the  mines  and  the 
other  places  which  use  unskilled  labour  as  we 
might  handle  cattle  and  horses,  it's  a  situa- 
tion that  the  people  back  home  need  not  be  told 
about.  The  immigrant  will  bear  it  all  because 
he  must,  denying  himself  every  comfort  to 
hasten  the  days  when  he  needs  bear  it  no  longer. 
It  is  a  terrible  price  he  pays,  but  he  pays  it  with 
a  cheerfulness  that  is  pleasant  to  behold  when 
once  you  have  looked  through  his  rough  and 
forbidding  exterior  into  his  heart. 

When  he  is  killed  in  the  course  of  his  work — 
and  he  has  a  monopoly  of  the  dangerous  and 
extra-hazardous  trades — the  verdict  of  the 
coroner's  jury  may  not  be  in  so  many  words 


48  THE  IMMIGRANT 

that  it  was  "  only  a  wop,"  but  it  might  as  well 
be — for  that  is  nearly  always  the  effect  of  it. 
Perhaps  fifty  thousand  such  verdicts  are  ren- 
dered annually  in  the  United  States,  but  "  they 
are  tough,  they  don't  mind  such  things/'  says 
many  a  mine  foreman. 

Next  to  the  advice  of  relatives  and  friends 
who  already  have  emigrated,  the  propaganda 
conducted  by  the  steamship  lines  is  the  most  im- 
portant immediate  cause  of  immigration  from 
Europe  to  America.  Remember  how  the  rail- 
roads advertised  when  new  territory  was 
opened  up  here  in  the  United  States?  See  the 
appealingly  beautiful  descriptions  of  this  new 
land  flowing  with  the  milk  and  honey  of 
plenty  ?  Here's  a  sample  farm  that  was  bought 
for  ten  dollars  an  acre  and  now  is  worth  one 
hundred;  and  exhibit  B  is  a  man  who  came 
here  with  a  thousand  dollars  and  now  is  worth 
a  fortune. 

That's  what  is  happening  to-day  in  the  im- 
migrant centres  of  southern  and  eastern  Eu- 
rope. The  immigrant  passenger  is  a  profitable 
animal  to  carry.  Ten  steerage  passengers  can 
be  carried  for  what  it  costs  to  transport  one 
first-class  passenger,  and  the  net  profit  is  many 
times  greater.  So,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the 
promotion  of  immigration  is  made  unlawful 
here  and  of  emigration  unlawful  abroad,  what 


WHY  THE  IMMIGRANT  COMES      49 

cannot  be  done  openly  is  done  through  local  and 
sub-agents. 

But  let  hard  times  come  here.  Then  it  is 
different.  Everybody  is  admonished  to  stay 
at  home  and  wait  until  it  blows  over,  and  the 
immigration  figures  show  that  the  advice  is 
heeded. 

The  panics  of  1873  and  1893,  and  even  that 
of  1907 — which  was  not  generally  regarded  as 
an  industrial  panic — caused  an  immediate  fall- 
ing off  in  the  stream  of  immigration  that  with- 
out such  financial  depression  gradually  rises 
and  rises,  promising  for  19 13  a  record-break- 
ing tide.  Whatever  may  be  the  toll  of  lives 
exacted  by  our  crushing  age  of  steel,  there  is 
not  the  slightest  fact  upon  which  to  predicate 
the  prediction  that  Europe  will  any  time  in  the 
near  future  cease  to  furnish  "  wops  "  in  plenty 
for  the  sacrifice. 


VI 


CONTRACT  LABOUR  AND  INDUCED 
IMMIGRATION 

ONE  of  the  classes  of  immigrants  that 
the  government  desires  to  keep  out  of 
the  United  States  is  made  up  of  la- 
bourers who  come  by  contract,  or  who  have 
their  passage  paid.  A  law  prohibiting  the  en- 
try of  such  immigrants  was  passed  in  1885  and 
has  been  strengthened  by  later  amendments. 
The  first  weakness  was  found  in  the  lack  of 
provision,  of  machinery  for  the  enforcement 
of  the  law.  The  first  amendment  gave  the  Sec- 
retary of  the  Treasury  the  right  to  exclude 
such  immigrants,  and  the  second  amendment,  in 
1888,  gave  him  the  right  to  deport  any  who 
were  discovered  here  within  a  year  after  their 
arrival. 

When  the  new  immigration  law  was  passed 
in  1907,  it  contained  a  broad  provision  shut- 
ting the  doors  of  our  ports  to  all  who  have 
been  induced  or  solicited  to  come  by  offers  or 
promises  of  employment  or  in  consequence  of 
either  written,  printed,  or  verbal  agreements, 
50 


LABOUR  AND  IMMIGRATION       51 

whether  express  or  implied.  It  must  also  be 
shown  that  no  organization  of  any  kind  what- 
soever paid  for  the  ticket  or  passage  of  the 
immigrant. 

The  law  provides  for  the  admission  of 
skilled  labour  under  contract,  when  such  labour 
unemployed  cannot  be  found  here,  and  for  the 
admission  of  professional  people  and  personal 
and  domestic  servants.  A  penalty  of  one  thou- 
sand dollars  is  imposed  for  the  violation  of 
the  act,  and  it  is  to  be  applied  to  any  person 
or  organization  prepaying  transportation  or  as- 
sisting or  encouraging  immigration.  Suit  may 
be  instituted  by  the  United  States,  by  any  per- 
son for  his  own  benefit,  or  by  the  alien  affected. 
The  issuance  of  circulars  or  advertisements  in 
foreign  countries  inviting  immigration  renders 
the  person  or  organization  doing  so  liable  to 
the  penalties  of  the  law,  and  the  immigrant 
coming  as  a  result  thereof  liable  to  deporta- 
tion. An  exception  is  made  of  the  states,  ter- 
tories,  and  the  District  of  Columbia.  They 
may  advertise  their  natural  inducements  to  im- 
migration. Steamship  lines  may  announce 
their  sailing  dates  and  tell  of  the  facilities  they 
offer,  but  may  not  tell  of  the  attractions  of  the 
United  States. 

It  has  been  found  to  be  one  thing,  however, 
to  enact  a  law  shutting  out  contract  labour  and 


52  THE  IMMIGRANT 

induced  immigration,  and  quite  another  to  se- 
cure an  effective  enforcement  of  it.  The  Com- 
missioner-General of  Immigration  says  it  is 
exceedingly  difficult  to  secure  evidence  that  will 
convict  the  person  or  organization  that  plainly 
is  surreptitiously  evading  the  law.  He  finds  it 
much  easier  to  find  the  immigrant  and  de- 
port him  than  to  detect  the  agency  that  brought 
him  in  a  specific  violation  of  the  statute. 

The  courts  have  been  inclined  to  be  liberal 
in  their  construction  of  the  law,  but  woe  betide 
the  immigrant  who  permits  it  to  leak  out  that 
he  has  a  certain,  definite  job  in  sight  when  he 
lands.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  the  almost  uni- 
versal opinion  of  the  immigration  authorities 
that  hundreds  of  thousands  of  immigrants  have 
a  better  idea  of  the  jobs  they  are  going  to  get 
than  the  law  allows.  A  still  larger  number  get 
here  under  direct  and  indirect  violation  of  the 
law  against  solicitation  of  immigrants. 

Large  employers  of  labour  have  a  smooth 

iway  of  getting  around  the  law.  The  prospec- 
tive immigrant  is  not  particular  about  having  a 
definite  contract  for  a  job  when  he  lands.  All 
he  cares  for  is  a  reasonable  assurance  that  there 
is  work  in  sight.  All  the  employer  has  to  do 
is  to  let  it  be  known  around  his  plant  that  he 
needs  more  labour  and  that  he  will  give  em- 
ployment to  the  relatives  and  friends  of  his 


LABOUR  AND  IMMIGRATION       53 

employees  when  they  come.  Letters  by  the  score 
are  sent  back  to  Europe,  some  containing  money 
for  tickets  for  relatives,  and  all  containing 
the  information  that  a  job  is  in  sight.  The 
next  steamer  brings  a  goodly  number  of  immi- 
grants in  response.  How  can  the  officials  of 
the  government  detect  or  punish  such  viola- 
tions of  the  spirit  if  not  the  letter  of  the  law? 

Then  there  is  the  immigrant  banker,  the  im- 
migrant grocer,  the  immigrant  saloonkeeper, 
and  their  like.  They  want  more  immigrants 
to  come,  for  it  makes  their  business  better. 
They  are  in  touch  with  steamship  ticket-agents 
at  home.  A  plant  which  needs  more  labourers 
only  has  to  tell  them,  and  straightway  a  stream 
of  letters  goes  to  Europe  telling  of  the  inces- 
sant demand  for  labour,  and  enclosing  fictitious 
newspaper  articles  telling  of  the  fine  living 
conditions,  the  good  wages,  and  the  like. 
Armed  with  these,  the  steamship  agent  in  Eu- 
ropean labour  centres  can  work  just  about  as 
successfully  as  our  own  American  railroad 
immigration  agent  worked  in  days  gone  by, 
although  he  must  work  surreptitiously. 

To  avoid  difficulty  with  the  immigration  au- 
thorities the  immigrants  who  come  in  this  way 
are  furnished  with  various  and  mostly  fictitious 
addresses,  and  only  the  leader  of  the  group, 
selected  for  his  superior  intelligence,  has  the 


54  THE  IMMIGRANT 

address  of  the  real  consignee,  who  usually  is 
an  immigrant  banker  or  saloonkeeper. 

Of  course  the  people  who  are  determined  to 
evade  the  law  know  its  ins  and  outs,  and  they 
are  always  careful  to  make  their  offers  and 
promises  in  such  a  vague  way  that  they  could 
hardly  be  held  by  the  courts  to  be  really  offers 
and  promises,  and  the  Immigration  Commis- 
sion admits  that  they  are  probably  not  actu- 
ally violations  of  the  letter  of  the  law. 

The  operations  in  behalf  of  emigration  in 
southern  and  eastern  Europe  are  not  carried 
on  for  the  purpose  of  assisting  the  emigrant  to 
establish  a  home  in  America  nor  to  supply 
American  employers  with  labour.  Rather,  they 
are  simply  for  the  purpose  of  getting  steerage 
passengers  for  steamship  lines.  Nor  are  they 
desirous  that  these  people  shall  come  to  the 
United  States  to  stay.  They  prefer  the  kind 
that  come  back,  for  that  means  two  steerage 
fares  instead  of  one. 

One  of  the  most  effective  of  the  promoters 
of  immigration  is  the  travelling  labour  agent. 
He  is  a  common  labourer  himself,  and  fre- 
quently travels  back  and  forth  between  the 
United  States  and  his  native  country.  He  is 
supposed  to  be  a  man  who  likes  America  so 
well  that  he  is  making  it  his  permanent  home, 
and  who  returns  to  his  home  country  only  to 


LABOUR  AND  IMMIGRATION       55 

see  the  "  old  folks."  He  tells  all  the  natives 
he  meets  of  the  splendid  opportunities  in 
America,  and  draws  an  idealistic  picture  of 
conditions  here.  If  his  auditors  are  interested 
and  would  go  but  for  fear  of  the  perils  of  the 
trip,  he  readily  assures  them  that  on  such  and 
such  a  day  he  will  be  going  back  himself,  and 
will  be  glad  to  look  after  them  en  route.  When 
they  meet  he  is  elected  the  leader  of  the  group, 
each  one  paying  him  a  certain  stipend  for  his 
services,  all  the  while  ignorant  of  the  fact  that 
the  steamship  company  pays  him  a  commission 
on  each  immigrant  he  gets,  and  that  the  labour 
agents  or  employers  in  America  will  also  pay 
him  so  much  per  head  for  his  wards. 

Another  method  resorted  to  by  the  foreign 
steamship  agents  is  to  scatter  circulars  of 
American  land  companies  and  labour  agents,  to 
inspire  the  discussion  of  immigration  in  the 
local  papers,  with  a  view  to  arousing  the  imagi- 
nation of  the  potential  immigrant.  Then  there 
are  runners  or  agitators  who  go  from  village 
to  village  to  stir  up  emigration  enthusiasm 
and  to  coach  prospective  immigrants  as  to  the 
answers  they  shall  give  when  they  reach  the 
gates  of  America.  They  deliver  lectures,  and 
in  some  cases  use  moving  pictures  to  tell  of 
the  wonders  of  America  and  the  successes  of 
their  brethren  here.    Often  prominent  citizens, 


56  THE  IMMIGRANT 

social  leaders,  and  even  lesser  government 
functionaries  are  sub-agents  of  the  steamship 
lines  at  a  commission  of  so  much  per  head  for 
every  immigrant  started  to  the  New  World. 

The  steamship  companies,  it  is  charged,  also 
act  in  collusion  with  the  local  money-lenders. 
An  immigrant  wants  transportation  to  the 
United  States  but  has  not  the  money  to  pay 
for  it;  the  money-lender  furnishes  him  the 
ticket  on  credit  and  charges  him  a  big  price 
for  it  and  a  bigger  interest  until  the  debt  is 
satisfied.  The  steamship  company  stands  be- 
tween the  money-lender  and  loss. 

The  Commissioner-General  of  Immigration, 
,Daniel  Keefe,  in  his  report  for  1912,  waxes  in- 
dignant in  contemplating  this  traffic  in  human 
freight  by  the  steamship  companies.  He  says, 
to  say  that  the  steamship  companies  are  respon- 
sible for  an  unnatural  immigration  is  not  to 
state  a  theory,  but  a  fact — a  fact  that  some- 
times becomes,  indeed,  if  not  always,  a  crying 
shame. 

Contrast  this  attitude  with  that  of  the  gov- 
ernment during  the  Civil  War  when  President 
Lincoln  came  to  the  conclusion  that  the  only 
way  to  supply  the  need  of  labour  to  take  the 
place  of  the  men  who  had  gone  into  the  armies 
was  to  establish  a  contract  labour  system  which 
would  permit  the  importation  of  labour  under 


LABOUR  AND  IMMIGRATION       57 

binding  contracts  to  secure  the  return  of  the 
passage  money.  This  law  was  afterward  found 
to  work  much  injustice  and  finally  was  re- 
pealed. 

At  one  time  the  nations  of  Europe  them- 
selves took  advantage  of  our  hospitality  to 
the  incoming  tide  by  using  this  country  as  a 
dumping-ground  for  their  criminals.  In  1866 
a  joint  resolution  was  adopted  by  Congress 
stating  that  it  had  been  ascertained  that  it  was 
proposed  in  Switzerland  to  pardon  a  murderer 
on  condition  that  he  would  emigrate  to  the 
United  States,  and  that  such  action  was  re- 
garded by  the  United  States  as  unfriendly  and 
inconsistent  with  the  comity  of  nations,  and 
authorizing  all  diplomatic  officers  to  insist  that 
such  acts  should  not  be  repeated. 


VII 
IMMIGRANT  RACES 

ONE  of  the  most  interesting  phases  of 
the  investigation  of  the  problems  of 
the  great  movement  of  humanity  from 
Europe  to  the  United  States  by  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission,  was  its  study  of  the  races 
which  furnish  America  with  its  immigrant 
population.  This  study  shows  something  of 
the  future  possibilities  of  our  immigrant  tide, 
revealing  the  numbers  of  each  race  that  have 
remained  behind,  the  proportion  that  has  come 
to  America,  and  the  probable  future  arrivals. 
Upon  some  races  we  have  made  such  heavy 
drafts  that  there  are  comparatively  few  more 
to  come.  Upon  others  we  have  made  like 
heavy  drafts,  but  their  great  numbers  and  their 
fecundity  have  prevented  any  material  cutting 
down  of  the  supply  in  sight. 

Under  the  direction  of  Dr.  Daniel  Folkmar, 
a  dictionary  of  our  immigrant  races  was  pre- 
pared for  the  Commission.  It  is  the  first  work 
that  ever  has  undertaken  fully  to  measure  the 
numerical  strength  and  the  geographic  distribu- 
58 


(Copyright  by  Underwood  and  Underwood,  N. 
ITALIAN   GIRLS. 


IMMIGRANT  RACES  59 

tion  of  immigrant  races  in  the  United  States. 
Having  done  this  it  gives  us  many  striking 
views  of  our  immigration  in  its  effect  upon 
European  peoples.  We  see  in  some  cases, 
notably  in  those  of  the  Slovaks  and  the 
Hebrews,  that  the  supply  is  so  small  and  the 
rate  of  immigration  so  large  that  it  may  termi- 
nate ultimately  from  the  exhaustion  of  the  stock. 
On  the  other  hand,  in  the  case  of  the  Russians, 
the  Germans,  and  the  Italians,  the  visible  sup- 
ply is  so  great  and  its  rate  of  recruitment  so 
high,  that  we  can  draw  from  them  indefinitely 
and  in  large  numbers  without  seriously  affect- 
ing the  general  balance. 

In  the  preparation  of  the  dictionary  of  im- 
migrant races,  Dr.  Folkmar  and  his  associates 
called  in  the  best  authorities  in  the  country  to 
check  up  and  verify  their  work.  Even  then 
troubles  were  encountered.  For  instance,  one 
of  the  great  distinctions  which  ethnologists 
make  between  races  of  people  is  the  shape  of 
their  heads.  They  are  sharply  divided  between 
long-headed  and  broad-headed  races,  and  the 
ethnologist  measures  the  effect  of  the  com- 
mingling of  races  by  the  changes  in  the  shape 
of  the  head.  Broad-headed  races  wear  big  hats 
and  long-headed  ones  have  long  faces  in  pro- 
file. 

It  was  stated  by  Dr.  Folkmar  and  his  asso- 


60  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ciates  that  some  of  the  Greeks,  rubbing  up 
against  other  races  to  the  north  and  east  of 
them,  had  changed  somewhat  from  the  "  long  *' 
to  the  "  broad  "  head.  Now,  if  you  want  to 
get  a  rise  out  of  a  Greek  tell  him  that  the 
Greek  head  is  not  so  long  as  in  the  days  of  an- 
cient Hellas.  He  prides  himself  upon  his 
ancient  ancestors.  He  wants  to  be  considered 
genuinely  Hellenic.  The  official  title  of  his  coun- 
try now  is  the  "  kingdom  of  Hellas,"  and  every 
subject  of  the  Danish  George,  no  matter  how 
mixed  in  his  race,  styles  himself  a  Hellene. 
When  it  was  stated  that  the  Greeks  were  more 
inclined  to  broad-headedness,  it  stirred  them 
up,  and  the  Greek  legation  took  up  the  ques- 
tion and  protested  against  such  a  base  slander 
upon  the  people  of  Greece.  But  scientific  fact 
cannot  be  changed  by  diplomatic  representa- 
tion, and  the  dictionary  shows  the  Greek  heads 
have  been  undergoing  a  change. 

Some  striking  illustrations  of  the  great 
movement  of  humanity  to  American  shores 
are  afforded  by  the  investigations  of  Dr.  Folk- 
mar  and  his  associates.  For  instance,  we  find 
that  there  are  more  Irish  and  their  children 
in  the  United  States  than  there  are  in  Ireland. 
There  are  about  five  million  in  America  as 
compared  with  four  and  a  half  million  in  Ire- 
land, and  they  are  still  coming  to  us  at  the  rate 


IMMIGRANT  RACES  61 

of  about  thirty  thousand  a  year.  No  other 
race  of  its  size  has  contributed  so  largely  to 
American  immigration  as  the  Irish.  During 
the  forty  years  following  1820  they  gave  us 
nearly  two-fifths  of  all  our  immigrants,  and 
since  the  beginning  of  1900  have  sent  us  ap- 
proximately half  a  million  of  their  people.  The 
Irish  tongue  is  rapidly  going  out  of  existence 
as  a  means  of  communication.  It  is  said  that 
there  are  fewer  than  five  thousand  people  in 
Ireland  who  can  read  books  in  Irish;  that  not 
a  single  newspaper  is  published  in  Irish  nor  a 
single  church  service  conducted  in  it.  Only 
four  people  out  of  a  thousand  in  Ireland  can- 
not speak  English,  and  they  are  mainly  in  the 
remote  western  part  of  the  country. 

The  Jewish  immigration  to  America  has 
been  vast  in  numbers  and  rich  in  material. 
They  have  come  here  as  Moses  led  his  hosts 
into  Canaan,  to  found  a  home  for  themselves, 
their  children,  and  their  children's  children, 
and  all  who  have  studied  the  immigration 
problem  with  profit  concede  that  in  the  Jew  we 
have  secured  one  of  the  best  elements  in  our 
citizenship.  New  York  City  alone  now  has  a 
Jewish  population  more  than  ten  times  as  great 
as  that  of  all  Palestine,  and  the  United  States 
as  a  whole  has  eight  times  as  many  as  all  Asia 


62  THE  IMMIGRANT 

together.  New  York  has  a  million  of  them, 
which  is  one-half  of  America's  Jewish  popu- 
lation. During  a  period  of  fourteen  years  they 
have  been  coming  to  our  shores  at  the  rate  of 
ninety  thousand  a  year.  The  entire  Jewish 
population  of  the  world  is  placed  at  eleven  mil- 
lion. Europe  has  eight  million  of  these,  and  it 
is  from  them  that  our  Jewish  immigration 
mainly  is  drawn. 

The  total  Czech  population  of  Europe,  which 
includes  the  Bohemians,  the  Moravians,  and 
the  Slovaks,  is  less  than  eight  million,  but  we 
received  nearly  500,000  in  a  single  twelve-year 
period.  Most  of  this  was  represented  by  the 
surprising  incoming  tide  of  Slovaks.  Out  of 
less  than  two  million  population  they  have 
given  us  nearly  400,000  in  twelve  years. 

The  wonderful  military  prowess  of  the  peo- 
ple of  the  Balkan  States — Servians,  Bul- 
garians, and  Montenegrins — during  their  war 
with  Turkey  focussed  the  attention  of  the 
world  upon  them.  The  Bulgarians  are  phys- 
ically of  one  stock  and  linguistically  of  an- 
other. They  are  of  Asiatic,  or  Mongolian, 
origin,  yet  speak  a  Slavic  tongue.  The  Turks 
form  only  one-seventh  of  the  population  of 
European  Turkey  as  it  stood  before  the  recent 
outbreak  of  hostilities,  and  practically  all  of 
central  Turkey  down  to  the  ^Egean  Sea,  except 


IMMIGRANT  RACES  63 

a  little  strip  along  the  coast,  which  was  occu- 
pied by  the  Greeks,  was  populated  by  Bul- 
garians. 

In  industrial  districts  in  the  United  States 
largely  peopled  by  foreigners,  one  hears  much 
about  the  Croatians.  They  are  people  who 
have  relatives  in  the  war  with  Turkey,  em- 
bracing the  Croatian,  the  Servian,  the  Monte- 
negrin, the  Bosnian,  and  several  lesser  peoples. 
They  are  coming  to  us  at  the  rate  of  nearly 
thirty  thousand  a  year,  but  the  present  situa- 
tion in  southern  Europe  is  likely  to  wipe 
out  the  major  portion  of  this  immigra- 
tion. 

Germany  has  furnished  the  United  States 
more  immigrants  since  1820  than  any  other 
single  country,  although  the  United  Kingdom 
as  a  whole  has  done  better  than  Germany,  giv- 
ing us  nearly  eight  million  souls  as  compared 
with  Germany's  six  million.  But  German  im- 
migration has  fallen  off  to  a  small  fraction  of 
its  former  proportions,  and  to-day  more  Ger- 
man immigrants  are  coming  to  the  United 
States  from  Austria  than  from  Germany 
itself. 

During  twelve  years  there  came  to  the 
United  States  enough  Italians  to  people  five 
cities  like  Rome;  enough  Greeks  to  people  two 
cities  like  Athens;  more  Poles  than  there  are 


64  THE  IMMIGRANT 

in  Warsaw ;  more  Scandinavians  than  there  are 
in  Stockholm;  more  Magyars  than  in  Kron- 
stadt;  and  more  Finns  than  in  Viborg. 

Italy's  contribution  to  American  immigra- 
tion of  nearly  two  and  a  quarter  million  souls 
in  twelve  years,  stands  out  as  a  marked  feature 
of  immigration  history.  Nearly  nine-tenths  of 
this  came  from  southern  Italy.  The  people  of 
northern  and  southern  Italy  speak  such  vary- 
ing dialects  that  they  scarcely  can  converse 
with  one  another.  In  some  parts  of  southern 
Italy  more  than  three-fourths  of  the  people  are 
illiterate.  Bosco,  the  Italian  statistician,  ad- 
mits that  Italy  leads  all  the  nations  in  the  num- 
ber of  crimes  against  the  person.  Niceforo, 
the  Italian  sociologist,  declares  that  the  in- 
habitants of  northern  Italy  possess  all  the  quali- 
fications for  good  citizenship,  but  that  the 
South  Italian  is  an  individualist  having  little 
adaptability  to  highly  organized  society.  Yet 
Italians  from  the  south  who  come  to  this  coun- 
try and  who  are  not  colonized  with  their  own 
people,  but  who  mingle  freely  with  native 
Americans,  rapidly  become  good  citizens. 

There  are  a  dozen  or  more  linguistic  races 
which  send  immigrants  out  of  eastern  Europe 
in  large  numbers.  The  Poles  gave  us  nearly  a 
million  immigrants  in  twelve  years,  the  Lithu- 


IMMIGRANT  RACES  65 

anians  175,000,  the  Ruthenians  150,000,  the 
Croatians  and  Slovenians  335,000.  All  of 
these  races  are  Slavs  except  the  Lithuanians, 
who  are  the  only  people  of  the  Lettic  group  in 
Europe. 

The  future  historian,  no  doubt,  will  acknowl- 
edge a  great  debt  to  the  painstaking  students 
who  are  compiling  from  year  to  year  the  statis- 
tics concerning  the  racial  characteristics  of  the 
flood  of  immigration  into  the  United  States. 
A  century  hence  the  student  of  this  question 
will  be  able  to  determine  with  scientific  pre- 
cision exactly  what  is  the  result  of  the  fusion 
of  the  nations  in  this  republican  melting-pot. 


VIII 
THE  STEERAGE  PASSENGER 

IT  is  doubtful  if  anywhere  else  in  the  entire 
civilized  world  can  such  vile  and  disgrace- 
ful treatment  of  human  beings  in  masses 
be  found  as  on  the  majority  of  the  steamships 
which  carry  our  immigrants  to  us.  The  con- 
ditions which  these  people  meet  beggar  descrip- 
tion, and  the  official  picture  that  has  been 
painted  of  it  is  so  startling  that  it  could  scarcely 
be  accepted  did  it  not  find  corroboration  in 
every  unofficial  picture  of  the  steerage  that  our 
best  word-artists  have  painted. 

One  stands  amazed  that  greed  for  gold  could 
lead  men  to  subject  their  fellow-beings  to  such 
conditions  as  the  steerage  passenger  endures, 
according  to  the  revelations  of  the  Immigration 
Commission.  The  picture  it  draws  is  a  careful 
one.  The  data  were  obtained  by  special  agents 
travelling  as  steerage  passengers  on  twelve 
transatlantic  liners  and  from  cabin  observa- 
tions of  the  steerage  on  two  others.  This  was 
done  in  1908,  when  the  immigration  reached  a 
very  low  ebb.  The  Commission  is  careful  to 
66 


THE  STEERAGE  PASSENGER      67 

tell  us  that  the  information  was  obtained  at  a 
time  when  travel  was  at  its  lightest  and  the 
steerage  at  its  best. 

Three  kinds  of  steerage  are  now  recognized 
— the  old,  the  new,  and  the  combination  of  the 
two.  The  old  brings  the  bulk  of  our  immigra- 
tion from  southern  and  eastern  Europe.  It  is 
unspeakably  bad.  The  new  brings  the  bulk  of 
the  immigrants  from  northwestern  Europe, 
and  it  is  all  that  can  be  desired.  Between  the 
two  classes  of  ships  are  those  which  are  be- 
ing transformed  from  the  old  to  the  new.  On 
these  a  difference  of  $7.50  per  ticket  is  the 
difference  between  decency  and  indecency,  be- 
tween a  chamber  of  horrors  like  the  Black 
Hole  of  Calcutta  and  comfortable  quar- 
ters. 

Heretofore  the  steamship  companies  have 
apologized  for  the  filthy  conditions  of  the  old 
steerage  by  saying  the  immigrants  were  a 
piggish  lot  of  people  who  would  render  the  first 
cabin  as  filthy  as  the  steerage  if  they  were  per- 
mitted ;  they  also  asserted  that  it  was  impossible 
to  better  conditions  as  long  as  "  such  cattle  " 
peopled  the  steerage.  But  now  we  find,  in  the 
ship  that  has  part  new  and  part  old  steerage 
accommodations,  that  the  immigrant  in  the 
steerage  is  not  different  from  the  remainder  of 
humanity — he  will  be  reasonably  clean  if  he 


68  THE  IMMIGRANT 

has  a  reasonable  chance.  The  Commission  con- 
cludes that  "  there  is  no  reason  why  the  dis- 
gusting and  demoralizing  conditions  that  have 
generally  prevailed  in  the  steerage  of  immi- 
grant ships  should  continue." 

Let  us  glance  at  the  Commission's  typical 
picture  of  the  old  steerage.  The  investigator 
who  painted  it  was  a  woman,  who  made  the 
twelve-day  voyage  in  the  steerage  travelling 
as  a  single  Bohemian  peasant  woman.  Before 
sailing  all  steerage  passengers  were  supposed 
to  be  vaccinated.  The  women  and  men  were 
vaccinated  in  separate  rooms  and  an  inspec- 
tion card  stamped  by  the  U.  S.  Consulate, 
certifying  that  they  had  been  vaccinated,  was 
given  them.  In  her  case  not  one  of  the  three 
scratches  had  punctured  the  skin.  She  found 
that  others  had  fared  the  same  way. 

The  compartment  in  the  steerage  for  single 
women  she  describes  as  better  than  those  for 
other  steerage  passengers.  The  bunks  were 
arranged  in  tiers,  each  having  a  straw  mattress 
covered  with  a  slip  sheet.  A  small  blanket  was 
the  only  covering  provided.  There  was  no 
pillow;  a  life-preserver  under  the  head  of  the 
mattress  was  the  substitute.  It  was  practically 
impossible  to  undress  properly  for  retiring,  be- 
cause of  lack  of  privacy  and  insufficient  cov- 
ering.    When  the  steerage  is  full,  each  pas- 


THE  STEERAGE  PASSENGER      69 

senger's  private  space  is  limited  to  his  bunk 
alone.  It  must  serve  him  at  once  as  sleeping 
quarters,  clothes  closet,  baggage-room,  kitchen, 
pantry,  and  what  not.  There  is  not  a  hook 
upon  which  to  hang  clothes,  not  a  receptacle 
for  refuse,  not  a  cuspidor,  and  no  convenience 
for  use  in  times  of  seasickness. 

There  were  two  washrooms,  used  indis- 
criminately by  men  and  women.  One  of  them 
was  7  by  9  feet,  with  ten  faucets  of  cold 
water  along  two  of  the  walls.  The  wash- 
basins resembled  in  size  and  shape  the  ordinary 
stationary  laundry  tub.  They  had  to  serve  as 
wash-basins,  dishpans,  laundry-tubs.  In  the 
other  room  the  equipment  was  identical,  except 
that  there  was  a  hot-water  spigot  that  did  not 
work,  and  a  four-foot  trough  for  dish-wash- 
ing, with  sea  water,  seldom  hot,  from  one 
spigot. 

Many  of  the  passengers  made  heroic  efforts 
to  keep  clean.  It  was  forbidden  to  bring  water 
into  the  sleeping  compartments  for  washing 
purposes,  but  even  when  the  women  rose  early 
and  carried  in  a  little  water  in  the  soup-pails, 
as  soon  as  they  were  discovered  they  were 
brutally  driven  out  by  the  stewards. 

The  law  requires  that  each  immigrant  shall 
be  furnished  with  all  the  eating  utensils  neces- 
sary.   They  are  each  furnished  with  a  work- 


70  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ingman's  dinner-pail,  a  spoon,  and  a  fork. 
Each  immigrant  must  care  for  his  own 
pail,  and  as  a  rule  has  nothing  but  cold  salt 
water  with  which  to  wash  it  throughout  the 
entire  trip.  The  pails  are  so  cheap  that  usually 
the  salt  water  rusts  them  and  makes  them  unfit 
to  use  before  port  is  reached.  Again  the  law 
requires  that  tables  shall  be  furnished  for  the 
passengers  to  eat  upon,  but  these  are  only  long 
single  board  affairs  usually  in  a  part  of  a  steer- 
age sleeping  compartment  not  used  on  that 
voyage  for  bunks.  All  of  the  foul  smells 
from  the  sleeping  compartments  come  unob- 
structed into  these  improvised  dining-rooms 
and  drive  the  passengers  to  the  open 
deck. 

The  investigator  says  that  one  morning  she 
wished  to  see  if  it  were  possible  for  a  woman 
to  rise  and  dress  without  the  presence  of  men 
onlookers.  She  waited  her  chance,  and  al- 
though the  breakfast  bell  rang  at  6.55  and  she 
was  ready  for  a  meal  at  7.15,  the  steward 
warned  her  not  to  come  so  late  again,  and  gave 
her  only  a  piece  of  bread.  The  meals  that 
were  served  were  bad  in  quality  and  prepara- 
tion, and  more  than  half  of  the  food  was 
thrown  into  the  sea.  The  daily  inspection  of 
the  immigrants  was  a  farce.  They  were  as- 
sembled   and    had    their    inspection    tickets 


THE  STEERAGE  PASSENGER      71 

punched  six  times,  covering  six  days.  From 
the  time  the  women  went  on  board  until  they 
landed  they  did  not  have  one  moment's  privacy. 
Not  one  young  woman  in  the  steerage  escaped 
attack.  The  investigator  herself  was  among 
these,  and  yet  the  steerage  officials  made  no 
effort  to  punish  the  offenders.  Some  resisted 
for  a  time  and  then  weakened;  some  fought 
with  all  their  physical  strength.  Two  refined 
Polish  girls  fought  with  pins  and  teeth.  The 
atmosphere  is  described  as  one  of  general  law- 
lessness and  total  disrespect  for  women,  which 
naturally  demoralized  the  women  after  a  time. 
Summing  up,  the  government  investigator 
says  that  her  life  during  those  twelve  days  was 
passed  in  a  disorder  and  in  surroundings  that 
offended  every  sense.  The  vile  language  of 
the  men,  the  screams  of  the  women  defending 
themselves,  the  crying  of  the  children  wretched 
because  of  their  surroundings,  and  practically 
every  sound  that  reached  the  ear,  irritated  be- 
yond endurance.  There  was  no  sight  before 
which  the  eye  did  not  prefer  to  close.  Every 
impression  was  offensive.  Worse  than  this 
was  the  general  air  of  immorality  due  almost 
wholly  to  the  improper,  indecent,  forced 
mingling  of  men  and  women,  who  were  total 
strangers  and  often  did  not  understand  a  word 
of  the  same  language. 


72  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Contrast  this  terrible  picture  of  conditions 
that  cry  to  heaven  for  remedy,  conditions  that 
apply  on  steamships  carrying  perhaps  two- 
thirds  of  our  immigrants — contrast  it  with  the 
picture  of  the  new  steerage,  where  the  people 
are  given  staterooms,  where  practically  every- 
thing is  on  a  simplified  second-cabin  basis,  the 
floors  kept  scrupulously  clean,  ample  toilet 
facilities,  separate  for  the  sexes,  are  provided, 
where  clean  towels,  clean  napkins,  and  clean 
bed  linen  are  furnished,  where  satisfactory 
food  is  supplied,  where  the  wants  of  the  sick 
and  of  the  children  are  looked  after,  where 
women  travelling  alone  are  safe  and  not  the 
prey  of  both  crew  and  male  passengers,  and  the 
difference  is  astonishing — and  yet  the  differ- 
ence in  price  on  ships  that  are  only  partially 
converted  from  the  old  to  the  new  steerage  is 
only  $7.50. 

How  long  the  United  States  will  permit  the 
major  portion  of  its  prospective  citizens  to 
make  their  voyage  to  America  under  such  con- 
ditions as  the  Immigration  Commission  says 
are  typical  of  the  old  steerage  no  one  can 
definitely  foretell,  but  the  indications  are  that 
these  disclosures  will  result  in  prompt  action 
by  Congress.  The  travels  of  the  agents  of 
the  Commission  in  the  steerage  seem  to  have 
been  the  first  time  that  the  government  ever 


THE  STEERAGE  PASSENGER      73 

has  studied  the  steerage  question  in  a  first-hand 
way.  Perhaps  ten  million  American  immi- 
grants have  received  such  treatment  as  the 
Immigration  Commission  found  to  exist — and 
millions  of  them  fared  worse  than  that. 

Of  course  there  is  the  defence  based  on  the 
assumption  that  each  immigrant  is  a  free 
agent;  that  he  comes  of  his  own  accord;  that  he 
is  content  because  he  will  cross  again  and  again 
under  the  same  circumstances.  But  in  this 
day  of  enlightenment  few  persons  not  wholly 
blinded  by  greed  will  justify  on  any  grounds 
the  cruelty,  the  indecency,  the  utter  horror  of 
the  old  steerage.  The  fact  is  proved  by  those 
steamship  lines  that  are  installing  the  new  type 
of  steerage  accommodations. 


IX 

LANDING  AT  ELLIS  ISLAND 

NO  cabin  passenger  ever  sailed  through 
the  Narrows  and  beheld  the  Statue  of 
Liberty  without  feeling  a  thrill  at  the 
sight.  If  it  were  not  the  thrill  of  patriotic 
devotion  to  his  native  or  adopted  land,  it  must 
be  a  thrill  of  pleasure  at  being  safely  across 
and  with  a  chance  to  set  foot  on  solid  ground 
so  soon  again.  But,  if  the  sight  of  the  god- 
dess stirs  the  cabin,  what  must  it  mean  to  the 
steerage?  To  the  steerage  a  new  world  is 
dawning  and  a  week  or  more  of  an  earthly 
purgatory  ending.  Dr.  Steiner,  the  eminent 
immigration  authority  who  has  carried  his  gos- 
pel of  kindness  into  many  a  steerage,  himself 
acknowledges  that  often  he  has  tried  to  over- 
come the  deep  despair  of  the  steerage  by  re- 
minding its  people  that  though  it  seems  like 
hell,  there  is  a  heaven  beyond.  He  says  that 
it  is  not  easy  to  travel  in  the  steerage;  not  be- 
cause there  is  not  room  enough,  or  air  enough, 
or  food  enough,  although  that  is  all  true;  but 
74 


LANDING  AT  ELLIS  ISLAND       75 

because  it  is  hard  to  believe  down  there  that 
the  God  of  Israel  is  not  dead. 

To  the  immigrant  Ellis  Island  is  an  ordeal. 
The  "  man  at  the  gate  "  is  a  big  giant  who  can 
speed  him  through  or  crush  the  life  out  of  his 
hopes  in  an  instant.  A  thousand  lies,  some 
useful,  some  useless,  and  some  unnecessary, 
are  prepared  in  the  hope  that  they  will  help 
in  the  navigation  of  the  tortuous  channel  of 
admission  to  America.  Passing  quarantine 
and  the  customs  officials  as  the  ship  comes  up 
the  bay,  it  is  warped  into  its  dock,  and  when 
the  last  cabin  passenger  has  gone  ashore  the 
steerage  people  are  put  into  barges  and  towed 
away  to  Ellis  Island,  where  final  judgment 
awaits  them.  Their  tickets  are  fastened  in 
their  caps,  or  pinned  to  their  clothes,  and  their 
bills  of  lading  are  in  their  hands.  When  they 
enter  they  are  lined  up  in  long  rows,  with  two 
doctors  for  each  row.  They  must  walk  down 
a  narrow  lane  made  by  rows  of  piping,  with 
an  interval  of  twenty  feet  between  them.  As 
they  approach,  the  doctors  begin  to  size  up 
each  immigrant.  First  they  survey  him  as  a 
whole.  If  the  general  impression  is  favourable 
they  cast  their  eyes  at  his  feet,  to  see  if  they 
are  all  right.  Then  come  his  legs,  his  body,  his 
hands,  his  arms,  his  face,  his  eyes,  and  his 
head.    While  the  immigrant  has  been  walking 


76  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  twenty  feet  the  doctors  have  asked  and  an- 
swered in  their  own  minds  several  hundred 
questions.  If  the  immigrant  reveals  any  in- 
timation of  any  disease,  if  he  has  any  deform- 
ity, even  down  to  a  crooked  finger,  the  fact  is 
noticed. 

If  he  is  so  evidently  a  healthy  person  that 
the  examination  reveals  no  reason  why  he 
should  be  held,  he  is  passed  on.  But  if  there  is 
the  least  suspicion  in  the  minds  of  the  doctors 
that  there  is  anything  at  all  wrong  with  him,  a 
chalk  mark  is  placed  upon  the  lapel  of  his  coat. 
After  passing  the  surgeons  who  examine  their 
health  tickets  and  their  bodies,  the  immigrants 
next  encounter  the  one  who  examines  their 
eyes.  With  towels  and  antiseptic  solutions  by 
him,  the  surgeon  rolls  the  eyelids  of  the  im- 
migrants back  on  a  round  stick  resembling  a 
pencil.  He  is  looking  for  trachoma.  Those 
discovered  to  have  it  are  sent  away  for  de- 
portation. 

The  line  moves  on  past  the  female  inspector 
looking  for  prostitutes,  and  then  past  the  in- 
spectors who  ask  the  twenty-two  questions  re- 
quired by  law.  Here  is  where  the  lies  are 
told.  Most  of  the  immigrants  have  been 
coached  as  to  what  answers  to  give.  Here 
is  an  old  woman  who  says  she  has  three  sons 
in  America,  when  she  has  but  one.    The  more 


LANDING  AT  ELLIS  ISLAND       77 

she  talks  the  worse  she  entangles  herself. 
Here  is  a  Russian  Jewish  girl  who  has  run 
away  to  escape  persecution.  She  claims  a  rela- 
tive in  New  York  at  an  address  found  not  to 
exist;  she  is  straightway  in  trouble. 

The  surgeons  mark  about  half  of  the  im- 
migrants with  chalk  marks  as  they  file  by,  and 
those  so  marked  go  to  another  pen  for  fur- 
ther examination.  Families  are  torn  asunder, 
and  no  one  has  time  or  opportunity  to  explain 
why.  Mothers  are  wild,  thinking  that  their 
children  are  lost  to  them  forever;  children  are 
frantic,  thinking  they  will  see  their  parents  no 
more.  Husbands  and  wives  are  separated  and 
for  hours  they  know  not  why  or  how. 

After  the  immigrants  have  passed  the  in- 
spectors comes  the  real  parting  of  the  ways — 
the  "  stairway  of  separation."  Here  are  three 
stairways,  one  leading  to  the  railroad  room, 
another  to  the  New  York  room,  and  another 
to  the  ferry. 

To  those  who  have  passed  muster  in  this  or- 
deal the  way  is  now  open.  They  are  inside  the 
gate  and  their  troubles  are  over.  But  here  is 
a  room  where  those  go  who  have  been  given 
tickets  marked  "  S.  I. — Special  Inquiry." 
This  takes  them  to  an  iron  barred  gate  behind 
which  sits  an  official  who  admits  them  and  has 
them    distributed    to    the    various    detention 


78  THE  IMMIGRANT 

rooms.  Sometimes  two  thousand  may  be  de- 
tained at  a  time.  Conditions  are  admittedly 
bad  in  some  of  these  rooms,  due  to  overcrowd- 
ing and  inadequate  facilities,  but  all  agree  that 
the  officials  and  those  under  them  do  all  in 
their  power  to  ameliorate  these  conditions. 

Those  detained  are  given  further  examina- 
tions. Such  as  are  able  to  pass  muster  under 
these  examinations  are  permitted  to  pass 
through  the  gates.  Those  who  are  temporarily 
ill  are  sent  to  the  hospital.  Those  who  are 
possibly  deportable  are  given  further  examina- 
tions by  special  inquiry  boards.  Those  to 
whom  the  gates  still  are  barred  after  these  in- 
quiries, have  the  right  of  further  appeal,  but 
reversals  are  not  very  frequent. 

Does  the  law  work  hardships  at  our  immi- 
gration stations  ?  Yes,  everybody  admits  that. 
Sometimes  men  are  turned  back  for  trivial 
causes.  Four  Greeks  were  going  to  Canada, 
via  New  York.  The  Canadian  law  requires 
each  immigrant  to  have  twenty-five  dollars. 
They  had  $24.37  each-  When  they  found  their 
funds  short  they  wanted  to  come  into  the 
United  States,  but  they  could  not.  A  child  is 
taken  down  with  a  contagious  disease  and  is 
carried  to  the  hospital.  The  mother  must 
wait  and  cannot  even  see  her  child.     A  man 


LANDING  AT  ELLIS  ISLAND       79 

and  his  son  have  had  their  money  stolen  from 
them  in  the  steerage;  they  lack  twenty  dollars 
and  must  go  back.  And  so  the  sad  tale  goes  on 
every  day. 

But  could  the  immigration  authorities  be  vest- 
ed with  discretion  in  the  matter  ?  Then  sixteen 
thousand  debarred  aliens  a  year  would  lay  siege 
to  their  sympathies  and  each  would  regard  his 
own  as  a  special  case,  and  innumerable  difficul- 
ties would  result.  All  authorities  agree  that 
the  system  in  vogue  is  just  about  as  humane 
and  as  free  from  hardships  as  any  system 
that  might  be  devised,  and  that  would  maintain 
the  interests  of  the  nation  as  paramount  to  the 
interest  of  the  individual  immigrant.  It  is, 
however,  equally  agreed  that  Ellis  Island  is 
often  overcrowded  and  needs  enlargement  and 
that  many  minor  changes  in  the  immigration 
laws  ought  to  be  enacted. 

Sixteen  thousand  immigrants  debarred  from 
the  United  States  in  a  year!  Half  of  these  are 
debarred  because  they  probably  would  become 
public  charges.  Some  2,300  were  deported 
upon  surgeons'  certificates  showing  that  they 
possess  mental  or  physical  defects  which  might 
affect  their  ability  to  earn  a  living.  Another 
1,800  were  sent  back  because  they  had  loath- 
some or  dangerous  contagious  diseases,  while 


80  THE  IMMIGRANT 

i>333  were  denied  admission  because  they  were 
contract  labourers. 

Ellis  Island  receives  about  two-thirds  of  all 
the  immigrants  that  come  to  America.  It  is 
really  a  plant  built  on  three  islands  with  cause- 
ways connecting  them.  Often  more  than  two 
thousand  immigrants  must  be  detained  over 
night,  and  of  course  there  is  much  congestion 
at  such  times.  To  shelter  and  feed  two  thou- 
sand people  over  night  is  a  large  task.  Some 
days  as  many  as  five  thousand  immigrants  ar- 
rive, and  to  dispose  of  them  means  only  two 
minutes  to  each  immigrant;  consequently,  the 
inspectors  must  work  rapidly  and  send  every 
doubtful  case  to  detention  for  further  investi- 
gation. The  next  day  may  bring  only  a  few 
hundred,  or  it  may  be  a  foggy  day  and  none 
will  come;  then  the  detained  ones  can  be  given 
more  attention. 

The  "  old  "  immigration  is  usually  easy  to 
inspect.  Few  of  them  come  who  are  not  eli- 
gible, for  our  immigration  laws  are  understood 
in  northwestern  Europe  much  better  than  in 
southern  and  eastern  Europe.  Five  thousand 
"  old  "  immigrants  can  be  put  through  easily 
in  a  day,  while  with  the  "  new  "  immigration 
such  a  task  would  represent  very  hard  work 
and  very  long  hours. 


LANDING  AT  ELLIS  ISLAND       81 

A  contract  restaurant  is  maintained  at  each 
important  immigrant  station,  where  food  can 
be  had  during  detention,  and  where  it  is  put 
up  in  boxes  for  those  going  on  railroad  jour- 
neys. These  boxes  cost  from  fifty  cents  to 
a  dollar. 

Special  immigrant  trains  are  made  up  to 
handle  those  who  travel  in  large  companies. 
At  other  times  they  are  furnished  special  cars, 
while  often  they  must  travel,  men  and  women, 
in  the  smokers  of  regular  trains.  The  immi- 
grant gets  a  slightly  cheaper  rate  than  first 
class,  but  they  usually  get  a  proportionately 
poor  service  for  their  money. 

Ellis  Island,  with  the  tragedies  of  detention 
and  deportation  that  must  be  enacted  constantly 
if  the  laws  are  to  be  executed,  is  a  great  theatre 
where  every  quality  of  human  nature  is  at 
play.  Here  one  beholds  a  happy  reunion — 
wife  has  come  to  join  husband  after  waiting 
for  a  year  until  he  could  get  money  to  send  for 
her.  There  is  another  wife  to  join  her  hus- 
band, but  she  has  trachoma  and  cannot  be  ad- 
mitted. Here  is  a  painted  woman  trying  to 
lie  herself  through  the  gate.  There  is  a  boy 
who  gets  tangled  up  in  the  forty  questions 
put  to  him,  but  finally  gets  through.  Here  are 
hundreds  who  have  failed  on  their  first  round  to 


82  THE  IMMIGRANT 

pass  muster,  and  they  are  gathered  in  a  great 
room,  some  hoping  and  praying,  some  weeping 
and  fearing,  some  cursing  their  fate.  But 
even  then,  we  admitted  838,000  during  the 
fiscal  year  19 12  and  deported  only  16,000. 

Not  at  any  other  place  in  all  the  history  of 
nations  have  been  enacted  so  many  silent 
dramas  of  the  human  heart  as  at  Ellis  Island. 
It  is  the  door  of  hope  to  millions  of  European 
peasants  who  are  saving  their  copper  coins 
against  a  chance  of  entering  there.  It  is  the 
gate  of  new  life  to  millions  of  adopted  Ameri- 
cans who  remember  that  there  they  were  freed 
of  countless  terrors  that  their  fathers  deemed 
unescapable.  And  it  has  been  the  seat  of  doom 
to  tens  of  thousands  who  have  been  turned 
away  from  its  portals. 


IMMIGRANT  HOMES  AND  AID 
SOCIETIES 

IMMIGRANTS  arriving  in  this  country  usu- 
ally expect  to  go  to  some  relative  or  friend 
or  to  have  some  relative  or  friend  to  meet 
them  upon  arrival.  But  it  frequently  happens 
that  these  relatives  or  friends  fail  to  meet  them 
or  to  send  funds  for  the  continuation  of  their 
journey.  In  such  event  the  letter  of  the  law 
would  require  the  immigrants  to  be  deported, 
since,  being  penniless,  they  are  likely  to  be- 
come public  charges.  But  where  there  are 
trustworthy  persons  or  organizations  who  will 
undertake  to  care  for  them  until  they  find  em- 
ployment or  are  brought  into  touch  with  their 
relatives  or  friends,  the  immigrants  may  be 
discharged  to  them  after  five  days'  detention. 
The  immigrant,  under  these  conditions,  is 
given  his  preference  of  being  discharged  to  the 
agents  of  the  homes  and  aid  societies  or  of 
being  deported.  Usually  he  takes  the  chance 
to  be  thus  discharged. 

In  order  to  afford  such  immigrants  the  op- 


84t  THE  IMMIGRANT 

portunity  of  landing  and  to  assist  other  immi- 
grants to  avoid  the  hundred  and  one  dangers 
of  being  turned  adrift  in  a  big  city  where  no 
one  else  tries  to  protect  them  from  the  innu- 
merable scoundrels  who  would  rob  them  and 
lead  them  into  vice,  many  churches  and  philan- 
thropic organizations  have  established  these 
immigrant  aid  societies  and  homes  for  the  care 
of  the  immigrants  until  such  time  as  they  can 
get  along  themselves. 

Some  of  the  societies  receive  annual  appro- 
priations from  various  European  governments 
for  their  services  to  the  immigrants  from  those 
countries.  Others  are  supported  by  people  of 
certain  races  for  the  benefit  of  immigrants  of 
their  own  nationality.  In  one  year  nearly  fif- 
teen thousand  immigrants  were  discharged  at 
Ellis  Island  to  homes  and  aid  societies.  The 
law  does  not  recognize  the  missionaries  who 
represent  these  organizations,  but  at  each  port 
the  Commissioner  of  Immigration  gladly  co- 
operates with  those  whose  places  are  carefully 
conducted.  Each  home  or  society  must  file 
application  for  the  privilege  of  having  immi- 
grants discharged  to  it,  and  its  duly  accredited 
agents  are  given  annual  passes  to  the  immi- 
gration station. 

These  societies  and  homes,  when  properly 
conducted,  undoubtedly  do  an  infinite  amount 


HOMES  AND  AID  SOCIETIES       85 

of  good.  Particularly  are  they  of  immeasur- 
able benefit  to  the  women  and  girls  who  come 
friendless  to  America.  But  the  investigation 
of  the  Immigration  Commission  revealed  the 
fact  that  many  of  them  were  not  properly  con- 
ducted, and  that  the  very  conditions  they  sought 
to  remedy  were  promoted  by  them. 

The  Immigration  Commission  a  few  years 
ago  investigated  the  whole  question  of  these 
societies  and  homes  with  great  care.  It  sent 
women  agents  interested  in  social  settlement 
work  into  the  field,  disguised  as  immigrants 
and  as  foreigners  seeking  work,  with  some 
others  as  applicants  for  immigrant  help  of 
various  kinds.  The  results  of  their  investiga- 
tions were  a  revelation  to  many.  At  some  ports 
it  was  found  that  the  commissioners  were  in- 
different to  the  qualifications  of  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  various  homes  and  societies; 
at  others  they  seldom  investigated  the  char- 
acter of  the  homes  and  societies  making  appli- 
cation for  permission  to  do  the  work;  while  at 
a  few  they  were  as  careful  as  the  limited  pow- 
ers of  investigation  permitted  them  to  be,  and 
yet  at  all  the  ports  there  were  workers  whose 
motive  was, "  revenue  only."  There  were  homes 
and  societies  which  did  not  properly  safeguard 
the  interests  of  the  immigrants  because  of 
carelessness     in     placing     them,     and     even 


86  THE  IMMIGRANT 

"  homes  "  where  an  absolutely  immoral  atmos- 
phere was  encountered. 

Missionaries  and  home  and  society  agents 
assist  arriving  immigrants  in  various  ways. 
They  write  letters  for  them,  help  them  to  get 
into  communication  with  friends  and  relatives, 
trace  lost  baggage,  escort  them  to  their  desti- 
nations, send  their  names  and  addresses  to 
those  who  can  look  after  them  if  they  are  go- 
ing to  other  cities,  appear  before  the  boards  of 
special  inquiry  in  their  behalf,  and  make  their 
appeals  to  the  Secretary  of  Commerce  and 
Labour  in  the  event  it  appears  that  the  decision 
of  the  commissioner  ought  to  be  altered.  When 
they  do  all  these  things  in  the  true  missionary 
spirit  they  are  rendering  an  invaluable  serv- 
ice to  the  immigrant.  But,  unfortunately, 
some  of  them  do  not.  In  spite  of  the  watchful- 
ness of  the  immigration  authorities  some  of 
these  missionaries  disgrace  their  profession  in 
many  ways.  Some  have  been  known  to  come 
to  the  stations  drunk,  some  take  money  for 
their  services  and  transform  themselves  into 
petty  attorneys,  while  others  have  been  known 
to  take  advantage  of  helpless  women.  But,  for 
the  most  part,  the  immigration  missionary  is 
upright  and  worthy. 

Some  of  the  homes  to  which  the  missionaries 
send  immigrants  are  all  that  could  be  desired. 


HOMES  AND  AID  SOCIETIES       87 

The  surroundings  are  clean  and  wholesome, 
the  moral  atmosphere  is  excellent,  the  food  is 
good,  and  the  charges  are  no  greater  than  the 
pocketbook  of  the  immigrant  will  allow. 
Often  they  charge  only  sixty  cents  a  day  for 
board  and  lodging,  and  even  less  when  it  is  by 
the  week.  But  more  important,  in  such  places 
the  managers  are  very  careful  that  the  women 
and  girls  shall  be  placed  where  there  is  a  good 
moral  atmosphere.  None  of  them  is  allowed 
to  go  to  places  which  cannot  give  satisfactory 
references,  and  a  card  index  with  a  follow-up 
system  keeps  the  home  in  close  touch  with  the 
immigrants  placed  until  they  become  firmly  es- 
tablished. 

Other  homes  are  as  careful  about  the  con- 
ditions with  which  the  inmates  are  surrounded 
while  they  remain  there,  but  are  distinctly 
careless  in  the  matter  of  placing  the  women. 
They  would  not  wittingly  send  a  girl  out  to 
act  as  a  servant  in  a  disorderly  house,  and  yet 
by  failure  to  investigate  requests  for  help,  fre- 
quently they  do  so.  Still  other  homes  did  not 
hesitate  to  send  girls  to  such  places,  even  after 
it  was  explained  to  them  that  such  was  the  na- 
ture of  the  places.  Of  forty- four  homes  in- 
vestigated half  of  them  did  not  draw  the  line 
on  sending  girls  as  servants  to  such  houses. 
The  missionaries  made  little  better  showing 


88  THE  IMMIGRANT 

than  the  homes  in  this  regard.  Twenty-one 
were  asked  for  servants  for  disorderly  houses; 
eleven  supplied  them.  Only  three  refused 
point-blank  to  do  so. 

Some  of  the  aid  societies  refer  immigrants 
to  employment  agencies.  Of  twenty-two  such 
agencies  that  were  licensed,  only  five  failed 
to  furnish  servants  for  applicants  from  dis- 
orderly houses.  Practically  every  unlicensed 
employment  agency  unhesitatingly  furnished 
such  help. 

In  some  of  the  homes  men  connected  with 
their  executive  staffs  were  guilty  of  immoral 
advances  toward  the  investigators  as  well  as 
toward  other  inmates.  The  method  of  the  in- 
vestigation usually  was  for  one  investigator 
to  get  admitted  to  the  home  and  to  stay  there 
for  several  days.  Then  another  investigator 
would  come  and  apply  for  a  girl,  explaining 
that  she  was  wanted  as  a  servant  to  tend  the 
door  in  a  manicure  establishment  that  was  en- 
joying police  protection,  and  which  was  run 
in  connection  with  a  lodging-house  for  tran- 
sients. Then  the  first  investigator  would  usu- 
ally be  called  in  and  asked  if  she  wanted  the 
job.  She  was  usually  admonished  that  if  she 
took  it  she  should  just  close  her  eyes  to  what 
went  on.  It  was  while  the  boarding  investi- 
gators were  staying  at  the  homes  that  improper 


HOMES  AND  AID  SOCIETIES       89 

advances  were  made.  In  one  instance  an  at- 
tempt to  commit  a  criminal  assault  upon  one 
of  the  investigators  was  made. 

Out  of  a  long  list  of  names  and  addresses  of 
immigrant  women  who  had  been  placed 
through  eleven  homes,  the  investigators  selected 
228  for  following  up.  It  was  found  that  only 
178  of  those  immigrants  had  gone  to  the  ad- 
dresses given.  At  fifty  addresses  given  no 
girls  had  ever  been  sent  for  or  received,  while 
there  were  no  such  addresses  in  eight  cases, 
and  three  were  the  addresses  of  disorderly 
houses. 

The  conditions  revealed  by  the  investigations 
of  the  Immigration  Commission's  agents  were 
made  known  to  the  immigration  authorities  at 
the  several  ports  where  these  abuses  were 
found  to  occur,  and  it  resulted  in  the  confirma- 
tion of  the  results  of  the  investigation  and  in 
proof  that  the  investigators  had  performed 
their  work  carefully  and  conscientiously,  and 
had  always  tried  to  stay  on  the  conservative 
side  of  the  facts  in  stating  the  results.  The 
immigration  authorities,  as  a  result,  communi- 
cated these  findings  to  the  immigration  so- 
cieties and  homes,  and  since  then  the  most  dili- 
gent efforts  have  been  made,  both  by  the  im- 
migration authorities  and  by  the  immigrant 
homes  and  societies,  to  weed  out  the  unworthy 


90  THE  IMMIGRANT 

and  to  make  sure  that  hereafter  proper  care 
shall  be  taken  that  young  immigrant  girls  that 
are  placed  by  the  organizations  shall  be  placed 
amid  wholesome  surroundings.  In  justice  to 
the  spirit  of  helpfulness  and  philanthropy 
through  which  immigrant  homes  and  societies 
have  been  established  and  are  maintained,  it 
is  to  be  said  that  the  abuses  that  have  been 
found  have  arisen  through  lax  supervision, 
which  has  been  more  the  result  of  confidence  in 
managements  which  have  proved  themselves 
unworthy  of  it,  rather  than  through  any  indif- 
ference to  the  fate  of  the  immigrant  girl. 

It  is  to  be  added  that  the  disclosures  that 
were  made  when  the  Immigration  Commission 
made  its  investigation  has  resulted  in  a  deter- 
mination upon  the  part  of  the  immigrant  homes 
and  aid  societies  which  are  honestly  trying  to 
help  the  immigrant  that  the  conditions  com- 
plained of  shall  not  occur  again.  Where  lax 
administration  was  found  there  have  been 
house-cleanings,  those  who  abused  confidences 
have  been  banished  from  the  work,  and  every- 
where there  has  been  a  commendable  deter- 
mination to  co-operate  with  the  immigration 
authorities  in  bringing  to  their  just  reward 
those  who,  whether  by  laxity  of  administration, 
indifference,  or  criminality,  have  permitted 
immigrants  whom  they  should  have  protected, 


HOMES  AND  AID  SOCIETIES       91 

to  be  preyed  upon  by  financial  or  moral  vul- 
tures. 

The  high  standards  set  by  those  homes 
which  were  all  that  such  institutions  ought  to 
be,  have  been  laid  down  as  the  standards  to 
which  all  homes  and  societies  and  individual 
workers  must  measure  up,  and  by  a  careful 
card-index  follow-up  system  such  as  a  few 
homes  and  societies  formerly  had,  all  of  these 
institutions  are  now  accomplishing  the  pur- 
poses for  which  they  were  founded — the  pro- 
tection of  the  immigrant   from  exploitation. 


XI 

DISTRIBUTION  OF  IMMIGRANTS 

IT  is  quite  generally  agreed  among  states- 
men and  philanthropists  that  if  the  "  new  " 
immigration,  which  is  flocking  to  our 
shores  at  the  rate  of  three-quarters  of  a  mil- 
lion souls  a  year,  is  to  be  a  blessing  and  an 
economic  asset  to  the. nation,  ways  and  means 
must  be  found  whereby  it  may  be  distributed 
widely  throughout  the  country — for  then  only 
can  the  digestive  juices  of  American  influence 
reach  the  entire  mass  and  fit  it  for  assimilation 
into  the  body  politic.  So  long  as  it  crowds 
into  colonies  and  holds  itself  aloof  in  com- 
munities that  never  feel  the  touch  of  American 
customs  and  ideas,  how  can  we  expect  it  to  be- 
come like  us  and  a  part  of  us? 

And  yet,  that  is  what  is  happening  right 
along.  Three-fourths  of  our  Russian  immi- 
grants are  to  be  found  in  cities  that  have  a 
population  of  twenty-five  thousand  and  up- 
ward. More  than  half  of  the  Italian  immi- 
grants, the  Polish,  the  Bohemian,  the  Hun- 
garian, and  the  Austrian  immigrants  gravitate 
92 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  IMMIGRANTS      93 

to  such  centres  of  population.  On  the  other 
hand,  less  than  one-fourth  of  our  native  Ameri- 
cans are  to  be  found  in  such  cities,  and  the 
same  is  true  qf  our  Scandinavian  immigrants. 
More  than  half  of  the  great  population  of  New 
York  City  is  of  foreign  birth,  and  there  are 
sections  of  the  metropolis  that  are  as  foreign 
to  America,  as  far  as  influences  go,  as  are 
Warsaw,  Naples,  or  Vienna.  The  list  of 
American  cities  where  the  foreign  population 
exceeds  the  native  is  a  large  one.  There  are 
some  fifty  cities  where  the  population  of  foreign 
birth  represents  more  than  two-fifths  of  the 
total,  and  among  these  are  some  twenty  where 
the  foreign  element  is  in  the  majority. 

Every  authority  agrees  that  it  is  desirable 
to  secure  as  many  settlers  on  the  land  as  pos- 
sible, but  there  are  some  who  do  not  believe 
in  any  other  sort  of  distribution  of  immigrants 
except  such  as  is  created  by  the  natural  work- 
ing of  the  law  of  supply  and  demand.  The 
ground  upon  which  they  predicate  their  belief 
is  that  it  will  tend  to  reduce  that  kind  of  living 
and  wages  which  they  call  "  the  American 
standard."  One  of  those  who  holds  this  view 
is  Commissioner  General  of  Immigration, 
Daniel  J.  Keefe. 

He  asserts  that  many  of  the  arguments  in 
favour  of  the  distribution  of  aliens  other  than 


94  THE  IMMIGRANT 

to  plant  them  on  the  land  are  fallacious.  He 
says  that  organizations  struggling  to  solve  the 
problem  of  putting  the  alien  where  he  is  needed, 
vary  from  those  moved  by  purely  business  im- 
pulses to  those  which  are  "  or  pretend  to  be, 
patriotic  or  philanthropic  in  their  purposes." 
They  range,  he  adds,  from  combinations  of 
ticket-agents,  money-lenders,  and  labour  agen- 
cies to  state  and  municipal  organizations  "  con- 
ducted bona  fide  and  from  high,  pure  motives.'' 
He  further  adds,  however,  that  the  latter 
"  often  incidentally  produce  some  of  the  same 
effects  as  the  selfish  organizations." 

In  commenting  upon  the  problem  he  says  if 
it  ever  was  feasible  to  devise  a  complete,  effi- 
cient plan  for  the  general  distribution  of  aliens, 
it  probably  is  now  too  late  to  stem  the  tide 
which  has  set  toward  certain  localities,  where 
alien  nucleus  colonies  have  been  established, 
constituting  new  reasons  why  aliens  are  drawn 
to  them;  even  though  a  certain  number  of  aliens 
may  be  distributed,  they  will  not  remain  where 
they  are  placed  unless  the  arrangement  coin- 
cides with  their  desires,  and  unless- they  are 
physically  and  mentally  adapted  to  their  new 
surroundings,  as  a  large  percentage  of  those 
who  now  insist  on  herding  in  the  cities  never 
will  be;  and  that,  viewed  from  a  national 
standpoint,  distribution  tends  to  increase  the 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  IMMIGRANTS      95 

difficulties  of  immigration  rather  than  to  re- 
duce them.  He  concludes  that  distribution 
will  tend  to  increase  immigration,  and  that  this 
will  in  turn  tend  to  drive  down  the  wages  of 
American  workingmen. 

There  are  many  students  of  the  problem, 
however,  who  take  direct  issue  with  Commis- 
sioner General  Keefe,  both  as  to  his  minor  and 
major  conclusions.  They  point  out  that  the 
same  fear  was  expressed  when  his  own  people 
began  to  come  and  continued  to  come  to 
America,  but  that  American  wages  are  higher 
and  American  workingmen's  standards  of  liv- 
ing are  better  than  they  were  before.  Like- 
wise, they  point  out  that  nearly  ninety  per  cent 
of  the  immigration  from  many  southern  and 
eastern  European  countries  comes  to  us  from 
the  village  and  the  farm,  and  that  to  say  they 
are  not  physically  or  mentally  fitted  for  any- 
thing else  than  to  herd  in  congested  communi- 
ties is  not  a  just  statement. 

It  is  further  pointed  out  by  those  who  oppose 
the  conclusions  of  Mr.  Keefe  that  neither  Con- 
gress nor  the  Immigration  Commission  has 
agreed  with  him,  but  has  taken  the  opposite 
view.  Congress  created  a  Bureau  of  Informa- 
tion for  the  purpose  of  collecting  information 
concerning  opportunities  for  immigrants  and 
disseminating  it  among  them  with  a  view  to 


96  THE  IMMIGRANT 

encouraging  a  beneficial  distribution  of  immi- 
grants. The  main  purpose  was  to  co-operate 
with  the  several  states  in  acquainting  immi- 
grants with  their  advantages. 

The  Immigration  Commission  likewise  con- 
cludes that  the  reason  the  immigrant  goes  to 
congested  cities  is  because  he  knows  of  no  bet- 
ter opportunities  elsewhere.  It  says  that  "  a 
large  part  of  the  immigrants  were  agricultural 
labourers  at  home,  and  their  immigration  is 
due  to  a  desire  to  escape  the  low  economic  con- 
ditions which  attend  agricultural  pursuits  in 
the  countries  from  which  they  come.  With  no 
knowledge  of  other  conditions,  it  is  but  natural, 
therefore,  that  they  should  seek  another  line  of 
activity  in  this  country." 

It  is  pointed  out  that  the  thing  to  do  is  to 
plant  the  immigrant  where  he  can  secure  a 
plot  of  ground  and  build  a  house  on  it,  because 
there  goes  on  most  rapidly  the  process  of 
Americanization.  Go  to  Brown  Park,  Omaha, 
which  has  been  improved  by  the  Bohemians, 
Poles,  and  Lithuanians.  What  was  a  few  years 
ago  a  rolling  prairie  is  to-day  studded  with 
neat,  well-kept  homes,  schools,  and  churches, 
having  well-cultivated  gardens  and  flowers,  and 
conforming  to  the  best  American  standards 
among  wage-earners.  Go  to  the  Italian  settle- 
ments in  Rockland  County,  N.  Y.,  Providence, 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  IMMIGRANTS      97 

R.  L,  and  Rosetta,  Penn.  There  the  immi- 
grants have  their  gardens,  no  matter  what  the 
soil  is,  and  sometimes  in  striking  contrast  with 
adjacent  homes  of  the  neighbouring  Ameri- 
cans. The  Poles  on  the  abandoned  farms  of 
New  England,  the  Italians  on  the  swamps  of 
New  Jersey,  and  the  Portuguese  on  Cape  Cod, 
have  shown  what  they  can  do  under  conditions 
that  have  driven  out  older  Americans,  have 
shown  that  they  can  rehabilitate  worn-out  soil 
and  build  up  a  competence  in  waste  places. 

The  lowest  wages  paid  in  America  go  to 
the  foreigner  and  the  highest  to  the  native 
American,  and  yet  the  investigations  of  the 
Immigration  Commission  into  home  ownership 
in  cities  reveal  the  fact  that,  while  only  4.2  per 
cent  of  the  native-born  Americans  of  native 
parentage  own  their  homes,  more  than  10  per 
cent  of  the  foreign-born  and  native-born  of 
foreign  parentage  own  theirs. 

A  striking  illustration  of  the  need  for  some 
sort  of  a  system  of  distribution  of  immigrants 
is  to  be  had  in  a  map  prepared  by  Peter  Roberts. 
He  takes  a  United  States  map  and  draws  a 
line  from  Atlantic  City  to  the  southeastern 
corner  of  Illinois.  Then  he  draws  another 
line  from  that  point  to  the  northwestern  corner 
of  Minnesota.  The  little  slice  of  territory  in- 
side of  this  angle  bears  about  the  same  rela- 


98  THE  IMMIGRANT 

tion  to  the  whole  United  States  as  one  slice  of 
pie  to  a  whole  pie — it  represents  only  a  little 
more  than  one-sixth  of  the  country's  area;  and 
yet,  within  that  comparatively  small  territory, 
live  nearly  five-sixths  of  all  the  "  new  "  immi- 
gration to  America. 

The  work  of  the  Division  of  Information 
of  the  Bureau  of  Immigration  affords  an  in- 
teresting indication  of  what  may  be  done  in  the 
direction  of  distributing  immigrants,  and  of 
the  interest  immigrants  themselves  take  in  the 
work.  More  than  thirty  thousand  applicants 
received  information  during  the  year  191 1,  and 
it  is  estimated  by  Chief  Powderly  that  these 
applications  represented  at  least  a  hundred 
thousand  immigrants.  The  Division  directs  no 
skilled  craftsmen,  miners,  or  other  underground 
workers.  It  simply  gave  them  information  as 
to  places  where  they  could  settle  in  villages 
and  towns  where  they  could  follow  other  lines 
of  activity  and  avail  themselves  of  garden  plats 
and  low  house  rent.  The  Division  does  not  ar- 
range contracts  for  employment,  but  simply 
gets  a  list  of  reputable  employers  who  need 
help,  and  furnishes  a  medium  through  which 
the  man  who  needs  work  can  be  brought  into 
touch  with  the  man  who  needs  help. 

In  addition  to  this  the  Division  gathers  and 
disseminates   information  concerning  the  re- 


DISTRIBUTION  OF  IMMIGRANTS      99 

sources,  products,  and  physical  characteristics 
of  the  various  states,  giving  the  immigrant  the 
name  and  address  of  the  state  official  in  each 
state  whose  duty  it  is  to  encourage  and  aid 
immigration  into  each  state.  Its  work  has 
been  highly  endorsed  by  the  Southern  Com- 
mercial Congress  and  by  the  National  Board 
of  Trade,  which  also  strongly  endorsed  the 
recommendation  of  President  Taft  that  immi- 
grant stations  be  established  at  one  or  more 
additional  Gulf  and  South  Atlantic  ports  with 
a  view  to  turning  part  of  the  incoming  tide 
away  from  New  York. 


XII 

THE    IMMIGRATION    COMMISSION'S 
INVESTIGATION 

THE  investigation  made  by  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission  into  all  phases  of  the 
subject  of  immigration  represents  the 
most  thorough  and  at  the  same  time  the  most 
expensive  inquiry  into  the  migration  of  man- 
kind that  ever  has  been  made.  In  1907  Con- 
gress revised  the  immigration  laws  to  some 
degree,  but  at  the  same  time  provided  for 
future  legislation  by  the  creation  of  the  Immi- 
gration Commission,  which  it  directed  to  gather 
the  facts  upon  which  such  new  legislation 
should  be  based.  The  Commission  was  com- 
posed of  three  Senators  appointed  by  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Senate,  three  members  of  the 
House  of  Representatives,  appointed  by  the 
Speaker,  and  three  persons  appointed  by  the 
President.  It  was  given  full  power  to  investi- 
gate, and  at  the  same  time  was  supplied  with 
unlimited  funds,  the  law  creating  it  providing 
"  that  such  sums  of  money  as  may  be  necessary 
100 


(From    National   Geographic   Magazine,   Washington,   D.    C.     Copyright 
TWO   ROUMANIANS. 


IMMIGRATION  INVESTIGATION     101 

are  hereby  appropriated  and  authorized  to  be 
paid  out  of  the  '  immigration  fund.'  " 

The  Commission  decided  to  make  a  first- 
hand investigation  rather  than  to  act  merely  as 
a  compiler  of  data  already  gathered.  It  in- 
vestigated every  possible  phase  of  the  question 
in  Europe  and  America,  going  with  the  utmost 
care  into  the  whole  question  of  the  causes  and 
effects  of  immigration  both  at  home  and 
abroad.  Upward  of  three  years  was  consumed 
in  the  inquiry,  and  as  a  result  a  report  cover- 
ing forty-two  volumes,  or  practically  thirty 
thousand  octavo  pages,  has  been  published.  It 
is  such  a  monumental  work  that  it  is  doubtful 
if  anybody  will  ever  read  it  from  A  to  Z. 
However,  it  has  a  two-volume  abstract  and 
index  which  digest  the  whole  report,  although 
there  are  many  things  in  the  full  report  that 
are  of  course  referred  to  only  in  the  briefest 
way  in  the  big  abstract. 

The  Commission  did  not  finish  its  work  until 
within  a  half-hour  of  the  time  the  law  required 
that  the  report  should  be  filed.  Representative 
William  S.  Bennet  of  New  York  desired  to  file 
a  minority  report,  but  declared  he  was  pre- 
vented from  so  doing  by  the  fact  that  the  ma- 
jority report  was  formulated  too  late  to  permit 
any  elaboration  as  to  his  views  and  conclusions. 

During  its  life  the  Commission  spent  $790,- 


102  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ooo  in  its  investigations.  There  were  quite  a 
few  criticisms  at  the  time  concerning  the  long- 
drawn-out  character  of  the  investigation  and 
the  unusual  expense  incurred,  but,  considering 
the  thoroughness  with  which  the  work  was 
done,  much  of  this  criticism  probably  was  not 
deserved. 

When  it  came  to  investigating  emigration 
conditions  in  Europe,  six  of  the  nine  members, 
accompanied  by  a  large  staff,  went  to  Europe 
in  May  and  stayed  until  September.  They 
visited  Italy,  Austria,  Hungary,  Finland, 
Greece,  Turkey,  and  practically  all  other  Eu- 
ropean countries.  Conferring  with  American 
diplomatic  and  consular  representatives,  hold- 
ing conferences  with  European  emigration 
authorities,  and  going  out  through  the  immi- 
grant-furnishing districts,  they  studied  care- 
fully the  causes  of  emigration  and  its  effects 
upon  the  countries  from  whence  the  immi- 
grants come. 

In  studying  the  relations  between  the  immi- 
grant and  various  American  industries  use  was 
made  of  a  large  corps  of  investigators.  Data 
were  gathered  from  the  individual  immigrant, 
the  household  of  the  immigrant,  the  employers 
of  immigrants,  and  from  local  officials,  organ- 
izations, and  institutions.  For  instance,  in 
gathering  information  concerning  immigrants 


IMMIGRATION  INVESTIGATION     103 

in  iron  and  steel  industries,  detailed  information 
was  received  from  86,000  employes,  and  an  in- 
tensive study  was  made  of  nearly  2,500  house- 
holds, the  heads  of  which  were  employed  in 
these  industries.  The  number  of  immigrants 
of  each  nationality,  the  number  of  their  chil- 
dren, and  the  number  of  native  Americans  en- 
gaged in.  the  industries  were  ascertained.  The 
occupations  of  the  immigrants  engaged  in  iron 
and  steel  manufacturing  before  they  came  to 
America  were  investigated,  while  the  weekly 
wages,  the  lost  time,  the  average  annual  earn- 
ings, the  family  income,  rents  paid,  number 
of  people  per  sleeping-room,  home  ownership, 
citizenship,  labour  organization  affiliations,  il- 
literacy, and  many  other  matters  were  inquired 
into. 

Some  of  the  investigations  of  the  Commis- 
sion were  put  to  immediate  and  practical  use. 
Its  agents  who  investigated  steerage  conditions 
on  transatlantic  passenger  ships  were  able 
to  pick  up  pieces  of  information  which,  re- 
ported to  the  Bureau  of  Immigration,  took  the 
form  of  recommendations  that  abuses  within 
the  law  could  better  be  remedied  by  the  steam- 
ship companies.  The  same  was  true  of  its 
investigation  of  the  immigrant  aid  societies 
and  homes.  With  the  information  placed  in 
the  hands  of  Commissioner  Williams,  at  Ellis 


104  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Island,  steps  were  promptly  taken  to  debar  a 
number  of  workers  from  the  island  and  to  re- 
quire the  immediate  correction  of  conditions 
complained  of  in  several  societies  and  homes. 

The  Commission's  investigation  of  the  white- 
slave traffic  was  a  very  thorough  one,  and 
information  was  put  into  the  hands  of  the 
immigration  authorities  which  resulted  in  the 
deportation  of  many  engaged  in  the  traffic  as 
well  as  many  of  their  victims.  Many  other 
cases  were  brought  to  light  which  deserved 
prosecution,  and  the  information  obtained  was 
placed  in  the  hands  of  the  United  States  Dis- 
trict Attorneys  in  many  cities,  with  the  result 
that  a  large  number  of  convictions  were 
secured. 

Perhaps  one  of  the  most  interesting  phases 
of  the  whole  investigation  had  to  do  with  the 
changes  in  bodily  form  of  the  descendants  of 
immigrants.  According  to  all  race  authorities 
the  most  permanent  and  stable  of  all  the  char- 
acteristics of  human  races  is  the  shape  of  the 
head.  All  else  usually  may  alter  in  a  race,  but 
it  will  continue  to  wear  about  the  same  kind 
of  hats,  and  have  just  about  the  same  style  of 
long  face  or  short  face  that  it  had  before.  But 
when  the  European  is  transplanted  to  American 
soil  he  undergoes  a  change.  The  round-headed 
east  European  Hebrew  becomes  inclined  to 


IMMIGRATION  INVESTIGATION     105 

have  a  long  head,  while  the  long-headed  south 
Italian  gradually  changes  to  a  shorter-headed 
race. 

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  there  is  a  tendency 
toward  a  uniform  type,  and  it  seems  certain 
that  just  as  soon  as  immigration  in  race- 
affecting  quantities  ceases  to  come  to  our  shores 
we  will  evolve  a  true  American  type,  a  sort 
of  composite  European.  Students  are  trying 
to  solve  the  problems  of  type  changes,  which 
not  only  affect  the  shape  of  the  head,  but  the 
colour  of  the  hair,  the  age  of  maturity,  and 
many  other  related  characteristics. 

As  a  result  of  its  investigations  the  Com- 
mission made  a  number  of  very  important 
recommendations  to  Congress,  the  majority  of 
which  have  been  incorporated  in  a  bill  vetoed 
by  President  Taft.  It  recommends  that  care 
be  taken  that  immigration  shall  be  such  in 
quantity  and  quality  that  the  process  of  assimi- 
lation will  not  be  made  too  difficult;  that  gen- 
eral legislation  on  immigration  should  be  based 
upon  economic  principles  and  business  con- 
siderations; and  that  business  expansion  ought 
not  to  be  permitted  to  lower  the  American 
standards  of  wages  and  living. 

It  specifically  recommends  that  aliens  con- 
victed of  any  crime  within  five  years  of  com- 
ing to  America  shall  be  deported;  that  no  im- 


106  THE  IMMIGRANT 

migrant  be  admitted  from  any  country  having 
adequate  police  records  who  cannot  produce  a 
satisfactory  certificate  of  character;  that  any 
alien  who  becomes  a  public  charge  within  three 
years  shall  be  deported.  It  says  that  in  order 
that  immigrants  may  be  protected  from  ex- 
ploitation, to  discourage  the  sending  of  savings 
abroad,  to  encourage  settlers  on  the  land,  and 
to  secure  a  better  distribution  of  immigration, 
the  states  ought  to  provide  for  the  inspection 
of  immigrant  banks,  regulate  labour  agencies, 
and  co-operate  with  the  Federal  Government 
in  bringing  their  opportunities  to  the  attention 
of  immigrants.  The  recommendation  is  also 
made  that  any  alien  trying  to  persuade  another 
alien  not  to  become  an  American  citizen  shall 
be  immediately  deported. 

With  reference  to  the  restriction  of  immi- 
gration the  Commission  concludes  that  the  first 
restriction  should  be  against  those  who  do  not 
intend  to  become  American  citizens.  Another 
restriction  recommended  by  the  Commission 
applies  to  those  who  cannot  read  or  write  in 
some  language.  It  concludes  that  there  is  to- 
day an  oversupply  of  unskilled  labour  in  the 
United  States,  and  that  a  sufficient  number  of 
immigrants  should  be  debarred  to  produce  a 
marked  effect  upon  the  unskilled  labour  supply. 

With  regard  to  Asiatic  immigration  the  Com- 


IMMIGRATION  INVESTIGATION     107 

mission  recommends  that  the  general  policy  of 
excluding  Chinese  labour  be  continued,  that 
the  present  understanding  concerning  Japanese 
and  Korean  immigration  be  permitted  to  stand 
without  further  legislation  so  long  as  the  re- 
striction continues  to  be  effective;  and  that  an 
understanding  be  reached  with  the  British  gov- 
ernment whereby  East  Indian  labourers  would 
be  effectively  prevented  from  entering  the 
United  States. 


XIII 
GENERAL  LEGISLATION 

THE  history  of  immigration  legislation 
and  attempted  legislation  in  the  United 
States  affords  an  interesting  sidelight 
upon  our  reception  of  the  immigrant  from  the 
beginning  down  to  the  present  time.  Prior  to 
1835  immigration  was  taken  as  a  matter  of 
course,  a  welcome  was  given  to  every  immi- 
grant who  came,  and  the  only  legislation  that 
was  enacted  was  the  law  for  the  protection  of 
steerage  passengers  passed  in  18 19,  and  for 
the  gathering  of  statistical  data  concerning  im- 
migrants to  America. 

But  the  great  inpouring  of  foreigners,  many 
of  whom  were  Catholics,  after  1835  began  to 
arouse  an  opposition  to  immigration  on  the  part 
of  some  Protestants.  This  opposition  culminated 
in  the  Native  American  or  Know-Nothing 
movement,  and  for  a  while  it  seemed  as  if  it 
might  accomplish  a  restriction  of  immigration. 
An  effort  to  make  nativism  a  national  question 
was  made,  and  although  it  gained  some  little 
headway,  the  feeling  against  foreigners  sub- 
108 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION         109 

sided  somewhat  during  the  forties,  but  the 
heavy  increase  in  immigrants  just  prior  to 
1850  again  stirred  up  the  anti- foreign  senti- 
ment, and  this  time  it  found  expression  in  the 
Know-Nothing  movement.  It  tried  to  capture 
the  presidency  in  1856,  nominating  Millard 
Fillmore  as  its  standard-bearer.  But  Ex- 
President  Fillmore  fared  worse  in  1856  than 
did  President  Taft  in  19 12,  for  he  carried 
only  one  state — Maryland.  And  it  is  probable 
that  he  carried  that  state  as  the  Whig  nominee 
rather  than  as  the  Know-Nothing  nominee. 

In  spite  of  the  Know-Nothings,  further  legis- 
lation was  enacted  in  1847  an^  1848,  throwing 
still  further  protection  around  the  steerage  im- 
migrant, and  when  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill 
was  pending  Congress  gave  the  right  of  partici- 
pation in  local  affairs  to  foreigners  who  had 
declared  their  intention  of  becoming  citi- 
zens. 

The  Federal  Government  did  not  really  as- 
sume control  of  immigration  until  1882,  prior 
to  that  time  it  having  been  regarded  as  a 
question  for  state  jurisdiction,  but  as  explained 
in  a  preceding  chapter,  in  1864  President  Lin- 
coln, desiring  to  keep  up  the  necessary  supply 
of  labour,  asked  Congress  to  encourage  the 
importation  of  contract  labour.  Such  a  law 
was  promptly  enacted  and  was  kept  on  the 


110  THE  IMMIGRANT 

statute  books  for  four  years,  when  it  was 
repealed. 

President  Grant  first  recommended,  in  a 
special  message  to  Congress,  that  immigration 
should  be  put  under  national  rather  than  state 
control.  But  the  states  continued  to  hold  the 
subject  as  one  within  their  jurisdiction  until 
1876,  when  the  Supreme  Court,  in  an  important 
case,  declared  that  any  state  law  providing  for 
the  compulsory  inspection  of  passengers  and 
detention  of  vessels  of  foreign  countries  was 
restrictive  of  foreign  commerce  and  therefore 
unconstitutional.  The  Court  then  did  an  un- 
usual thing  for  the  Supreme  Court,  recom- 
mending that  Congress  take  jurisdiction  over 
these  matters,  setting  forth  that  it  could  "  more 
appropriately,  and  with  more  acceptance,  exer- 
cise it  than  any  other  body  known  to  our  law." 
It  further  added  that  if  Congress  would  take 
control  of  immigration  it  would  effectively  and 
satisfactorily  settle  a  serious  matter  which  had 
long  given  rise  to  contest  and  complaint. 

Congress,  six  years  later,  acted  upon  the 
recommendations  of  the  Supreme  Court  by 
passing  a  general  immigration  law.  This  law 
imposed  a  head  tax  of  fifty  cents  on  ^ach  im- 
migrant, and  this  money  was  used  at  the  port 
of  collection  for  the  enforcement  of  the  im- 
migration law  and  the  care  of  immigrants  after 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION  111 

their  arrival.  The  law  gave  the  Secretary  of 
the  Treasury  jurisdiction  over  immigration 
matters  and  authorized  him  to  enter  into  con- 
tracts with  such  state  officers  as  might  be  de- 
signated by  the  governor  of  any  state,  to  take 
charge  of  the  local  affairs  of  immigration 
within  such  state.  The  law  provided  that  for- 
eign convicts  (except  those  convicted  of  politi- 
cal offenses),  lunatics,  idiots,  and  persons  likely 
to  become  public  charges,  should  not  be  per- 
mitted to  land. 

The  law  of  1882,  farming  out  to  the  states 
the  control  of  immigration,  failed  of  its  pur- 
pose, and  by  1888  there  was  such  continued 
assertion  that  its  terms,  as  well  as  those  of  the 
law  prohibiting  the  immigration  of  contract 
labourers  enacted  in  1885,  were  being  violated 
and  evaded,  that  a  committee  was  appointed  by 
the  House  to  investigate  the  matter. 

This  committee  recommended  that  the  en- 
forcement of  the  immigration  law  should  be 
entrusted  solely  to  state  officers,  praised  the 
"  old  "   immigration,   condemned  the  "  new,"  / 

and  announced  that  the  time  for  restricted  im-  fc*" 
migration  had  arrived.  In  1 889  the  Senate  and 
House  created  standing  committees  on  immi- 
gration, and  they  jointly  made  a  further  in- 
vestigation. The  result  was  the  law  of  1891, 
which  added  many  features  still  found  in  the 


112  THE  IMMIGRANT 

immigration  law.  It  gave  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment sole  control  of  immigration,  excluded 
persons  suffering  from  loathsome  and  danger- 
ous contagious  diseases,  and  entrusted  to  the 
Public  Health  and  Marine  Hospital  Service  the 
important  task  of  making  the  necessary  health 
inspections.  It  strengthened  the  contract  la- 
bour law,  and  required  the  steamship  companies 
bringing  deportable  aliens  to  American  ports 
to  carry  them  back  at  their  own  expense. 

In  1892  still  another  investigation  was  or- 
dered, and  a  joint  committee  of  the  two  houses 
of  Congress  recommended  further  changes. 
It  reported  that  inspection  up  to  that  time  was 
largely  a  farce,  and  based  on  this  the  law  was 
amended  in  1893,  by  which  the  boards  of  in- 
quiry were  created.  The  following  year  the 
head  tax  on  immigrants  was  raised  to  one 
dollar. 

In  1897  Congress  passed  another  law,  which 
excluded  those  aliens  over  sixteen  who  were 
physically  able  but  who  could  not  read  or  write, 
exception  being  made  of  the  parents,  grand- 
parents, minor  children,  and  wives  of  ad- 
missible immigrants.  President  Cleveland 
vetoed  this  measure,  which  was  the  first  liter- 
acy test  ever  passed  by  Congress.  He  said,  in 
answer  to  the  charge  that  our  immigration 
was  falling  off  in  quality,  that  the  same  thing 


GENERAL  LEGISLATION  113 

was  said  of  immigrants  who,  with  their  de- 
scendants, are  now  numbered  among  Ameri- 
ca's best  citizens.  He  thought  a  hundred 
thousand  illiterate  immigrants  who  came  to 
found  homes  and  to  work  were  less  dangerous 
than  one  unruly  agitator.  The  House  passed 
the  bill  over  Cleveland's  veto,  but  the  Senate 
refused  to  do  so. 

In  1903,  after  the  investigation  by  the  Indus- 
trial Commission  had  been  made,  the  House 
again  passed  an  immigration  law  with  the  lit- 
eracy test  in  it.  The  Senate  refused  to  concur 
in  the  establishment  of  such  a  test,  but  added  a 
provision  increasing  the  immigrant  head  tax 
from  one  dollar  to  two  dollars.  The  immigra- 
tion and  naturalization  of  anarchists  was  pro- 
hibited. This  bill  finally  became  a  law,  and 
although  the  immigration  question  continued  in 
the  forefront  of  legislative  interest,  no  addi- 
tional legislation  was  enacted  until  1907,  when 
out  of  a  number  of  bills  Congress  finally  agreed 
upon  a  law  which  raised  the  head  tax  to  four 
dollars,  created  the  Immigration  Commission, 
and  empowered  the  President  to  refuse  entrance 
to  the  immigrants  from  any  country  who  hold 
passports  to  other  countries  than  the  United 
States,  when  those  passports  are  being  used  to 
enable  the  holders  to  come  to  the  United  States 
to  the  detriment  of  internal  labour  conditions. 


114  THE  IMMIGRANT 

This  is  the  clause  under  which  Uncle  Sam  ex- 
cludes Japanese  and  Korean  labourers  from 
the  United  States — a  sort  of  diplomatic,  sugar- 
coated  exclusion  act  without  any  offense  to 
Japan  in  it. 

The  law  of  1907  also  set  the  face  of  the 
nation  more  positively  against  the  international 
traffic  in  "  white  slaves/'  and  this  feature  of 
the  law  was  strengthened  by  another  law  en- 
acted in  19 10.  % 

The  Commissioner  General  of  Immigration 
in  19 1 2  prepared  the  draft  of  a  law  embodying 
his  ideas  on  immigration.  This  bill  provides 
some  advanced  recommendations,  which  would, 
if  incorporated  into  law,  save  many  thousands 
of  dollars  in  charity  and  prison  expenses  to  the 
country.  It  provides  that  criminals,  paupers, 
violators  of  the  white-slave  laws,  alien  seamen, 
and  others  may  be  deported  within  five  years 
after  their  entry  into  the  United  States.  The 
Secretary  of  Commerce  and  Labour  is  made 
the  final  judge  in  all  these  matters.  There  are 
many  other  provisions  calculated  to  strengthen 
the  hands  of  the  immigration  authorities  in 
keeping  out  undesirable  immigrants  and  to 
compel  the  steamship  companies  to  aid  the 
United  States  in  carrying  out  the  law  rather 
than  aiding  immigrants  to  evade  it. 


XIV 
THE  ALIEN  IN  THE  MINE 

THE  immigrant  long  has  been  the  main- 
stay of  the  American  mining  industry. 
For  instance,  he  and  his  children  con- 
stitute practically  three-fourths  of  the  labour 
force  of  the  bituminous  coal  mines  of  the 
United  States.  And,  generally  speaking,  the  bulk 
of  this  immigrant  labour  found  in  the  mines  is 
but  lately  arrived  and  of  the  "  new  "  immigra- 
tion. Prior  to  1890  the  average  bituminous 
coal  miner  was  a  native  American,  a  Welsh- 
man, a  Scot,  an  Irishman,  an  Englishman,  or  a 
German.  He  wielded  a  pick,  and  his  work 
required  skill  and  experience.  He  undercut 
the  coal,  drilled  his  own  holes,  fired  his  own 
shots,  and,  together  with  his  helper,  loaded  his 
coal  on  cars  at  so  much  per  ton  for  the  entire 
operation. 

Then  came  the  invention  of  the  mining  ma- 
chine, capable  of  doing  the  work  of  many  pick- 
miners,  and  thereafter  large  numbers  of  help- 
ers and  coal-shovellers  were  needed.  With  the 
coal  undercut  by  machinery,  the  holes  drilled 
115 


116  THE  IMMIGRANT 

in  the  same  way,  and  the  shots  fired  by  an  ex- 
pert in  his  line,  any  immigrant,  however  il- 
literate, and  however  ignorant  of  mining  con- 
ditions, could  do  the  bulk  of  the  hand-work  in 
the  mine.  The  result  was  that  the  husky  Slovak, 
whose  only  skill  was  main  force  and  awkward- 
ness, could  do  more  work  than  the  miner  of 
the  "  old "  immigration.  After  the  Slovak 
came  the  Magyar,  the  Pole,  and  the  Italian. 
And  when  they  came  into  the  mine  their  prede- 
cessors went  out. 

One  frequently  hears  that  the  "  new  "  im- 
migrant gets  into  a  certain  line  of  work,  drives 
out  the  native  American  and  the  "  old  "  immi- 
grant, and  then  stays  there.  But  this  is  not  a 
fair  statement  of  conditions.  They  work  there 
for  a  while,  and  soon  one  discovers  many  of 
them  searching  better  fields  in  the  same  indus- 
try, or  climbing  up  a  rung  of  the  industrial 
ladder  into  work  on  top  of  the  ground — maybe 
into  a  steel  plant,  a  plough  factory,  or  the  like. 

The  "new"  immigrant,  illiterate,  inexperi- 
enced, unable  to  speak  or  to  understand  Eng- 
lish, makes  an  excellent  mine  worker.  He  can- 
not talk  back  to  his  boss,  he  is  unacquainted 
with  anything  that  savours  of  insubordination, 
and  his  training  in  the  fields  in  Europe,  where 
he  frequently  had  to  walk  four  or  five  miles 
from  his  village  home  to  his  work  and  back, 


THE  ALIEN  IN  THE  MINE       117 

and  work  from  sun  to  sun,  has  made  him 
tractable  and  willing  to  work  hard.  He  is 
usually  glad  to  get  work  at  the  wages  the  opera- 
tor is  willing  to  pay,  for  that  is  a  great  im- 
provement over  what  he  got  at  home.  His 
low  standards  of  living,  his  ready  acceptance 
of  a  low  wage  and  existing  working  conditions, 
his  lack  of  permanent  interest  in  his  occupa- 
tion, his  indifference  to  labour  organizations, 
his  slow  progress  toward  assimilation,  have 
made  him  the  employe  the  operators  want, 
and  the  principal  obstacle  in  the  way  of  com- 
pelling better  conditions  for  the  miner. 

The  story  of  Calumet,  in  the  northern  pen- 
insula of  Michigan,  illustrates  the  immigrant's 
monopoly  of  the  mining  industry  in  America. 
It  is  a  city  of  45,000,  and  almost  as  un-Ameri-* 
can  as  Naples,  Warsaw,  or  Trieste.  It  is  diffi- 
cult to  find  an  American  in  the  place.  There  is 
a  babel  of  tongues,  twenty  different  races  con- 
stituting its  population.  Sixteen  nationalities 
are  represented  in  its  school-teaching  force. 
Its  people  are  the  foreigners  and  their  children 
who  live  by  the  copper  mines  under  Lake  Su- 
perior. The  native-born  are  the  ones  who  have 
colonized  at  Calumet,  and  they  have  named 
their  settlement,  "  Houghton.'' 

The  men  who  mine  our  coal  were  not  always 
human  moles  burrowing  in  the  ground  year 


118  THE  IMMIGRANT 

in  and  year  out.  Only  one-fifth  of  those  who 
mine  the  soft  coal  of  the  country  ever  worked 
in  a  mine  before  they  came  to  America,  and 
nearly  three-fifths  of  them  grew  to  manhood 
working  in  the  fields  of  southern  and  eastern 
Europe.  Perhaps  they  were  sheep-herders  fol- 
lowing their  flocks  over  the  rough  hills;  may- 
hap they  worked  in  the  bright-hued  poppy 
fields.  Whatever  they  did  they  lived  close  to 
nature,  amid  bright,  health-giving,  strength- 
making  surroundings.  Now  they  must  work 
where  never  a  ray  of  natural  light  comes. 

Peter  Roberts  strikingly  tells  the  story  of 
the  miner  of  to-day.  "  *  Production/  *  ton- 
nage/ "  he  says,  "  that  is  the  talisman  in  the 
life  of  so  many  managers  who  want  to  make  a 
record,  and  they  forget  the  men  who  ought  to 
count  for  more  than  production.  In  a  coal- 
shaft  where  the  labour  force  was  almost  wholly 
foreign,  the  man  in  charge  wanted  to  make  a 
record.  '  Get  out  the  coal/  was  the  order,  and 
the  wheels  were  running  at  their  swiftest.  A 
boy  came  and  said,  *  There's  fire  on  level  three/ 
The  foreman  replied,  '  It's  a  mistake,  get  out 
the  coal.'  An  hour  passed,  and  another  warn- 
ing came;  but  the  word  was  passed,  'We  are 
breaking  the  record,  get  out  the  coal.'  Then 
another  half -hour  of  rushing  out  the  coal,  and 
then  the  cry, '  The  third  level  is  full  of  smoke.' 


THE  ALIEN  IN  THE  MINE       119 

The  wheels  stopped;  but  it  was  too  late;  no 
word  could  be  sent  to  the  surface.  The  air 
current  changed,  and  none  of  the  men  on  that 
level  could  escape.  The  manager  made  his 
record,  but  it  was  a  record  so  gruesome  that 
ninety  million  people  felt  the  shock  the  next 
morning.  Put  the  man  first  and  tonnage  sec- 
ond, and  many  accidents  will  be  prevented. 
We  have  kept  the  wheels  of  industry  running, 
and  also  the  hearse.  We  have  made  records, 
and  so  has  the  recording  angel." 

At  the  same  time  it  must  be  remembered 
that  the  immigrant's  indifference  is  oftentimes 
the  cause  of  accidents  in  mines  as  well  as  else- 
where. Some  of  them  are  so  reckless  and  take 
so  many  chances  that  the  added  risk  alone  has 
been  sufficient  to  banish  native  American  and 
older  immigrants  from  the  mines.  The  Bu- 
reau of  Mines  puts  some  of  the  burden  of 
responsibility  for  accidents  upon  the  shoulders 
of  the  miners  themselves.  It  says  that  some 
of  them  are  inexperienced  and  do  not  take 
proper  precautions  for  their  own  safety  or  for 
the  safety  of  others,  and  that  this  becomes  a 
serious  menace  unless  they  are  restrained  by 
carefully  enforced  regulations. 

The  average  wage  paid  the  miner  is  not 
large.  The  investigation  of  the  Immigration 
Commission  showed  that  all  miners  over  18 


120  THE  IMMIGRANT 

years  of  age  averaged  $2.19  per  day,  but  that 
they  worked  only  enough  days  in  the  year  to 
make  their  total  income  per  year  $443.  Only 
two-fifths  of  the  families  investigated  showed 
that  they  could  live  on  the  wages  of  the  head, 
of  the  house  alone.  More  than  a  third  of  them 
supplemented  the  family  income  by  keeping 
boarders,  and  some  of  them  had  children  at 
work.  In  this  connection  it  is  interesting  to* 
note  how  other  industries,  dependent  upon  the 
labour  of  women  and  children,  are  affected  in 
their  distribution  by  the  mining  industry.  For 
instance,  cigar  and  tobacco  factories,  silk  mills, 
clothing  manufacturing  establishments,  and 
other  small  industries  gather  around  the  min- 
ing centres,  for  here  is  a  cheap  supply  of 
woman  and  child  labour,  forced  out  of  the 
home  by  the  necessities  of  the  family  ex- 
chequer. The  silk  industry  is  largely  concen-  * 
trated  in  the  Pennsylvania  anthracite  region  be- 
cause of  the  labour  supply  there. 

But  the  foreigner  in  the  mine  seems  cheer-  • 
fully  to  suit  his  standard  of  living  to  his  in- 
come. This  is  illustrated  by  the  rents  paid  per 
person  among  native-  and  foreign-born  families 
investigated  by  the  Immigration  Commission. 
The  Bulgarians,  for  instance,  were  able  to 
crowd  themselves  so  much  that  the  rent  of 
their  houses  averaged  only  ninety-seven  cents 


THE  ALIEN  IN  THE  MINE       121 

a  month  per  person.  The  Macedonians  did 
better  still,  their  average  expense  for  house 
rent  being  seventy-eight  cents  per  person. 
Nearly  all  of  the  "  new  "  immigrants  were  able 
to  hold  the  expenditu/e  below  $1.50  per  month. 

One  may  find  much  encouragement  for  the 
future  by  observing  how  much  better  the  sons 
and  daughters  of  foreigners  live  than  their 
parents.  The  investigation  shows  that  while 
the  average  foreigner  spends  only  $1.51  a 
month  for  the  roof  over  his  head,  his  native- 
born  children  spend  $2.50.  The  native  Ameri- 
cans in  the  same  industries  spend  $2.58  per 
month.  This  difference  is  due  rather  to  the 
number  of  people  living  in  a  house  than  to  the 
rental  rates  on  the  house.  This  shows  that  the 
second  generation  is  not  willing  to  live  under 
such  crowded  and  insanitary  conditions  as 
their  fathers,  and  that  in  a  single  generation 
they  approximate  the  American  standard. 

The  indications  are  that  for  many  years  to 
come  the  miners  who  dig  the  coal  with  which 
we  run  our  railroads,  steamships,  factories, 
furnaces,  and  mills,  and  with  which  we  heat 
our  homes,  will  still  come  from  southern  and 
eastern  Europe,  and  they  will  continue  to  live 
as  men  down  in  the  darkness  of  the  earth 
rather  than  as  men  up  in  the  sunlight  of  day, 
but  at  the  same  time  they  will  probably  join 


122  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  races  that  came  before  them  in  giving  to 
America  a  sturdy  yeomanry  in  their  children. 
They  may  resist  the  leaven  of  Americanization^ 
but  their  children  will  be  willing  subjects  for 
its  processes. 

It  is  because  of  that  very  fact  that  it  be- 
hooves Americans  who  have  more  than  one 
generation  of  American  ideals  behind  them  to 
do  all  in  their  power  to  make  especial  provision 
for  the  nurture  and  care  of  the  children  of » 
our  pit-toiling  immigrants.  They  must  not 
only  be  educated  in  the  three  R's,  but  their 
bodies  must  be  cared  for,  they  must  not  too 
young  be  offered  up  to  our  modern  Molochs, 
they  must  be  saved  from  that  license  of  un- 
morality  to  which  unaccustomed  liberty  so  often 
leads. 


(From    National    Geographic    Magazine,    Washington,    D.    C. 
A   FINNISH    GIRL. 


Copyright,    1913.) 


XV 
THE  FOREIGNER  IN  THE  FACTORY 

MORE  than  four-fifths  of  the  immi- 
grants who  enter  the  factories  of 
America  are  unskilled  labourers.  In 
the  past  ten  years  not  less  than  six  million  such 
unskilled  workers  have  been  recruited  into  the 
industrial  army  of  the  United  States.  In  two 
generations  this  movement  has  transformed  the 
country  from  a  nation  almost  wholly  given  to 
agriculture  into  one  that  is  in  the  very  van  of 
the  industrial  nations  of  the  earth,  a  phenome- 
non without  precedent  in  history. 

America  boasts  of  its  industrial  supremacy, 
and  yet  what  a  vast  proportion  of  this  su- 
premacy it  owes  to  the  immigrants  who  left 
Europe  to  come  here !  Where  would  our  iron 
and  steel  industry  be  if  the  seven-tenths  of  the 
workers  who  are  foreigners  or  sons  of  foreign- 
ers should  walk  out?  What  would  become  of 
the  so-called  beef  trust  if  three-fourths  of  its 
workers  who  are  foreigners  should  suddenly 
become  disgusted  with  foul  Packingtown  and 
throw  up  their  jobs?  Where  would  we  get  the 
123 


124  THE  IMMIGRANT 

coal  to  turn  our  wheels  of  industry  if  the  seven- 
tenths  of  the  miners  represented  by  foreigners 
and  their  sons  should  suddenly  decide  to  work 
at  trades  where  the  light  of  day  may  be  with 
them?  How  would  we  continue  our  supply 
of  plate-glass,  window-glass,  bottles,  and  glass 
tableware  if  the  foreign  contingent  and  their 
sons  who  constitute  three-fifths  of  the  labour 
force  of  the  glass  industry  were  to  eliminate 
themselves  ? 

What  would  become  of  our  woollen  and 
worsted  mills  if  the  seven-eighths  of  their 
wage-earners  who  are  foreigners  and  their 
children  should  walk  out?  What  would  be- 
come of  the  silk  mills  if  the  four-fifths  who  are 
foreigners  and  their  children  should  cease  to 
be  wage-earners?  And  if  the  nine-tenths  of 
the  cotton-mill  operatives  who  are  foreigners 
and  their  families  were  to  leave  their  looms, 
America  might  have  to  go  back  to  the  clothes 
made  of  skins.  Were  it  not  for  the  foreigner 
a  "  hand-me-down "  suit  could  scarcely  be 
bought  for  love  or  money.  And  when  we  re- 
member that  the  foreigner  and  his  children 
make  half  of  our  shirts,  collars,  and  cuffs; 
tan,  curry,  and  finish  nearly  five-sixths  of  our 
leather;  make  half  of  our  gloves;  refine  nearly 
nine-tenths  of  our  oil,  and  nearly  nineteen- 
twentieths  of  our  sugar;  and  supply  nearly  half 


FOREIGNERS  IN  THE  FACTORY     125 

of  the  labour  in  the  manufacture  of  our  tobacco 
and  cigars,  we  see  that  he  is,  after  all,  quite  an 
important  factor  in  our  industrial  supremacy. 

The  foreigner  has  a  monopoly  upon  the  dan- . 
gerous,  the  dirty,  and  the  odorous  trades.  In  the 
slaughtering  industry  you  will  find  him  usually 
in  such  places  as  the  hide-curing  rooms,  where 
they  shake,  count,  and  pack  the  slimy,  slippery 
hides;  in  the  fertilizer  plant  where  the  refuse 
of  the  slaughter  house  is  assembled  amid  un- 
speakable stenches;  in  the  soap-making  de- 
partment where  fats  are  reduced  and  the  alka- 
lis mixed,  and  where  unbearable  odours  persist 
all  the  time.  And  yet  you  find  him  a  patient, 
cheerful  worker,  content  with  his  average 
wage  of  $557  a  year. 

Visit  a  big  contract  work  like  the  New  York 
aqueduct  orvthe  Barge  Canal,  and  here  again 
you  find  the  foreigner.  Go  to  the  lumber  camps 
of  the  Northwest  and  he  greets  you.  And  yet 
wherever  they  are  encountered  they  are  found 
to  be  the  backbone  of  industry,  ready  to  take 
the  hardest  and  most  unpleasant  jobs,  and  to 
work  under  taskmasters  who  are  sometimes  not 
less  harsh  than  the  Simon  Legree  of  "  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin.'' 

One  of  the  peculiar  things  about  the  for-.* 
eigner  in  the  factory  is  the  tendency  toward 
racial  monopoly  in  many  lines.     The  French 


126  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Canadian  is  mainly  to  be  found  in  cotton  fac- 
tories, copper  mining  and  smelting,  %ahd  the 
boot  and  shoe  trade.  The  Croatian  is  found 
in  the  mine,  the  steel  plant,  and  the  filthy 
trades.  The  Danes  take  to  leather,  furniture, 
and  collars  and  cuffs.  The  Dutch  work  in  fur- 
niture factories  and  silk  making  and  dyeing. 

America's  era  of  greatest  expansion  has  been  • 
coincident  with  the  rise  of  the  "  new  "  immi- 
gration. In  the  thirty  years  since  the  new 
tide  of  humanity  began  to  set  in  in  earnest,  the 
capital  of  our  industries  has  increased  some  six- 
fold and  the  value  of  their  products  about 
threefold.  There  are  those  who  regret  that 
the  tide  from  southern  and  eastern  Europe  ever 
set  in.  One  class  says  that  if  the  "  new  "  im- 
migrant had  not  come  wages  would  have  con- 
tinued upon  such  a  high  plane  that  the  people 
of  northwestern  Europe  could  not  have  turned 
away  from  such  an  opportunity,  and  that  we 
would  still  be  getting  the  bulk  of  our  immigra-. 
tion  from  there.  Others  declare  that  the 
immigrant  is  largely  responsible  for  the  expan- 
sion that  took  place.  According  to  this  view 
he  was  attracted  by  then  existing  opportunities, 
and  his  presence  in  large  numbers  stimulated 
the  capital  to  devise  new  ways  and  means  of 
using  him,  the  end  of  which  stimulation  was 
our  great  industrial  expansion. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  THE  FACTORY     127 

But,  perhaps,  more  to  the  point  is  the  story  i 
of  the  inventions  which  have  made  it  possible 
for  the  raw  immigrant  of  the  present  to  do 
more  than  the  skilled  native  of  the  past.  Take 
the  cotton  factory.  Here,  after  a  brief  train- 
ing, the  ignorant  immigrant  is  able  to  operate 
the  automatic  looms  and  ring  spinning  frames 
that  do  the  work  which  formerly  required  skilled 
weavers  and  mule  spinners.  In  the  glass  fac- 
tory the  unlettered  labourer,  with  the  aid  of 
machinery,  can  now  do  as  good  work  and 
vastly  more  of  it,  as  the  best-trained  glass- 
blower  could  do  thirty  years  ago.  The  in-  . 
ventor  is  perhaps  the  man  to  whom  the  credit 
for  our  industrial  expansion  must  be  given. 
He  devised  machines  that  are  able  to  more  than 
supply  the  difference  between  the  awkwardness 
of  the  ignorant  labourer  and  the  ability  of  the 
skilled  workman. 

The  immigration  from  eastern  and  southern* 
Europe  has  adversely  affected  the  labourt 
unions  of  the  communities  into  which  they 
have  gone.  In  the  cotton  goods  industry,  for 
instance,  it  is  only  the  fact  that  the  new  labour 
has  been  controlled  by  the  skilled  employes, 
such  as  the  weavers  and  tenders  of  the  slashers, 
that  has  saved  the  labour  unions  from  disrup-l 
tion.  It  is  only  at  Fall  River  that  the  unions 
are  strong  enough  to  enforce  their  demands, 


128  THE  IMMIGRANT 

and  at  that  only  9,000  out  of  a  total  of  30,000 
employes  belong  to  the  unions.  The  greatest 
difficulty  with  which  the  labour  leaders  have  to 
contend  has  been  the  low  standard  of  living 
among  the  workmen  of  the  "  new  "  immigra- 
tion, and  their  willingness  to  accept  work  under 
conditions  and  at  wages  entirely  unsatisfactory 
to  the  older  employes.  They  do  not  like  to  join, 
the  unions  because  of  the  dues,  and  this  pre- 
vents the  labour  organizations  from  accumu- 
lating the  necessary  resources  for  conducting 
strikes\y 

In  pleasing  contrast  with  conditions  that  now 
obtain  in  such  mill  centres  as  Lawrence  and 
Lowell  is  the  story  Charles  Dickens  told  of  the 
operatives  at  Lowell  after  his  return  home. 
He  said  the  girls,  who  were  of  sturdy  New 
England  parentage,  were  all  well  dressed  and 
extremely  clean;  they  were  healthy  in  appear- 
ance and  had  the  manners  of  refined  young 
women;  the  rooms  in  which  they  worked  were 
as  well-ordered  as  themselves.  In  all,  he  said, 
there  was  as  much  fresh  air,  cleanliness,  and 
comfort  as  the  nature  of  the  occupation  would 
possibly  admit.  He  further  declared  they  were 
such  a  healthy-looking  lot  that,  assuming  it 
was  necessary  for  them  to  gain  their  daily 
bread  by  the  labour  of  their  hands,  there  was 
not  one  he  would  have  removed  if  he  had  had 


FOREIGNERS  IN  THE  FACTORY     129 

the  power.  He  thought  it  a  remarkable  fact 
that  in  many  of  the  operative  boarding-houses 
there  were  joint-stock  pianos,  that  nearly  all  of 
the  young  women  subscribed  to  circulating  li- 
braries, and  that  among  them  they  published  a 
periodical. 

Another  writer,  herself  a  mill-girl  for  years, 
says  that  except  in  rare  instances  the  rights 
of  the  early  mill-girls  were  secure.  They  were 
subject  to  no  extortion;  if  they  did  extra  work 
they  were  paid  in  full  for  it,  and  their  own  ac- 
count of  labour  done  by  the  piece  was  accepted. 
They  kept  the  figures  and  were  paid  accord- 
ingly. 

The  results  that  may  be  accomplished  by  the 
manufacturer  who  employs  labourers  of  the 
"  new  "  immigration  are  shown  by  the  experi- 
ence of  the  superintendent  of  a  large  plant  in 
Ohio,  which  employs  several  hundred  Magyars,  i 
When  they  first  came  they  had  the  usual  un- 
desirable qualities  of  the  new  immigrant.  But 
the  superintendent  planned  to  eliminate  these 
qualities.  He  became  a  member  of  their  fra- 
ternal society,  advised  them  in  their  invest- 
ments, put  his  name  down  as  a  charter  member 
of  their  church,  loaned  them  money  at  nominal 
interest,  built  them  a  hall,  and  called  in  experts 
to  lay  out  a  plan  of  amusements,  educational 
work,  and  lectures.     He  says  of  the  results: 


130  THE  IMMIGRANT 

"  After  twelve  years  of  experience  our  works 
have  gathered  together  a  splendid  force  of  men. 
We  started  out  with  a  small  reading-room 
with  a  competent  instructor  in  English,  and 
found  it  necessary  to  build  a  larger  building. 
They  have  succeeded  in  building  two  churches, 
have  a  number  of  beneficial  societies,  and  are 
better  citizens  and  better  workmen.  I  can  only 
add  that  if  it  could  be  made  possible  for  every 
large  concern  employing  this  class  of  labour  to 
see  the  splendid  results  which  we  have  ob- 
tained, I  feel  sure  they  would  not  hesitate  to  put 
forth  every  effort  to  extend  the  work." 


XVI 
THE  FOREIGNER  ON  THE  FARM 

EVERYBODY  knows  that  the  majority 
of  the  immigrants  from  northwestern 
Europe  have  planted  themselves  on  the 
soil — that  they  came  to  America  to  cast  their 
lot  forever  with  its  fortunes.  A  large  per- 
centage of  them  are  engaged  in  farming.  More 
than  half  of  the  Norwegians  in  America  are  on 
the  farm,  nearly  half  of  the  Swedes  are  there, 
and  nearly  half  of  the  Danes.  Two-fifths  of 
the  Swiss  and  a  third  of  the  Germans  have 
helped  make  up  our  grand  totals  in  crop-raising, 
stock-raising,  dairying,  etc. 

Even  the  "  new  "  immigration  is  not  wholly 
given  over  to  mining  and  manufacturing. 
Some  of  the  immigrants  are  going  to  the  land. 
When  the  Immigration  Commission  made  its 
investigation  there  were  some  forty  Italian  agri- 
cultural colonies  and  communities.  And  they 
have  been  doing  well.  Whether  upon  the  muck 
lands  of  New  York,  the  sandy  barrens  of  New 
Jersey,  the  rock-strewn  hills  of  New  England, 
or  the  heavy  black  Brazos  cotton  lands  of 
131 


132  THE  IMMIGRANT 

Texas,  they  have  been  able  to  make  a  fair  liv- 
ing, and  often  by  working  early  and  late,  with 
an  incredible  expenditure  of  labour,  to  make 
productive  lands  upon  which  Americans  have 
all  but  starved.  They  thrive  best  in  communi- , 
ties,  for  the  Italian  is  pre-eminently  a  social 
being  and  likes  to  have  close  and  sympathetic 
neighbours  as  well  as  lands.  In  industry,  thrift, 
careful  attention  to  details,  crop  yields,  and 
other  matters  he  compares  well  with  the  other 
farmers  of  his  vicinity.  His  patience,  un- 
flagging industry,  and  capacity  for  hard,  mo- 
notonous labour  make  him  a  good  farmer. 

Where  the  second  generation  of  Italians! 
grow  up  on  the  little  farms  of  their  fathers 
they  develop  into  a  sturdy  people,  measuring 
up  in  the  main  to  all  the  best  standards  of 
second  generations  of  foreigners  in  America. 
In  the  big  settlement  at  Vineland,  N.  J.,  whichl 
is  the  largest  rural  Italian  settlement  in  the 
United  States,  the  second  generation  is  stick- 
ing to  the  little  truck-farm  and  making  money. 

Not  only  are  the  Italians  starting  farming 
communities  in  many  parts  of  the  country,  but 
in  the  southern  cotton  fields,  notably  in  the} 
"  delta  "  region,  they  are  in  prime  favour  as 
cotton-pickers,  and  also  as  labourers  on  sugar 
plantations,  in  many  places  being  regarded  as 
much  superior  to  negro  labour. 


FOREIGNERS  ON  THE  FARM     133 

Most  of  the  Italian  farm-owners  are  men 
who  started  out  as  pick-and-shovel  men,  rail- 
road section  men,  and  labourers  on  general 
construction  work.  Some  of  them  were  fac- 
tory workers.  But  once  they  began  farming 
others  followed  their  example,  and  soon  their 
relatives  and  friends  in  Italy  began  coming,  so . 
that  before  long  they  had  established  a  settle- 
ment. 

Where  the  Hebrews  have  gone  to  the  land 
they  usually  have  done  fairly  well.  With  them, 
as  with  the  Italians,  their  most  successful  colony . 
is  probably  the  one  near  Vineland,  N.  J.  This 
colony  was  established  amid  pine  barrens  about 
1882,  and  was  conducted  largely  upon  a  com- 
munistic basis  until  1890,  when  it  seemed  to  be 
upon  the  verge  of  failure.  Then  some  money  r 
from  the  Baron  Hirsch  Fund  was  made  avail- 
able for  the  financial  rehabilitation  of  the 
colony.  Since  that  time  it  has  thrived  and 
to-day  stands  out  as  an  evidence  of  what  the 
Hebrew  may  do  when  he  goes  to  farming  in- 
stead of  to  merchandising.  Some  of  them  have 
developed  a  new  sort  of  agriculture — summer- 
boarder  agriculture  it  has  been  called.  The 
Hebrew  farmer  opens  his  house  to  the  summer 
boarder  and  thus  makes  his  own  market  for  his 
products.  The  Jewish  Agricultural  and  In-/ 
dustrial  Aid  Society  now  operates  an  experi- 


134  THE  IMMIGRANT 

mental  farm  on  Long  Island  and  prospective 
rural  colonists  are  offered  a  course  of  instruc- 
tion in  farming.  It  is  the  opinion  of  the  Im- 
migration Commission  that  as  a  pioneer  farmer/ 
the  Jew  might  not  be  a  great  success,  but  that, 
if  he  has  the  means  to  begin  with,  he  will 
usually  make  a  success  where  he  starts  on  an' 
ordinary  American  farm. 

The  Poles  are  beginning  more  and  more  to 
turn  to  agriculture  as  a  means  of  livelihood, 
and  there  are  some  fifty  settlements  where  they 
are  found  in  considerable  numbers,  these  settle- 
ments representing  nearly  seven  thousand  fami- 
lies. Some  few  settlements  were  established 
before  the  Civil  War.  But  it  was  not  until 
about  1885  that  the  Polish  communities  began-7 
to  dot  the  prairies  of  the  Dakotas  and  Minne- 
sota. Some  of  the  settlers  were  immigrants 
direct  from  Europe,  but  more  of  them  were 
labourers  who  had  spent  several  years  in 
American  mines  and  factories,  and  had  saved 
some  money.  They  usually  bought  land  more 
with  an  eye  to  its  cheapness  than  to  its  produc- 
tivity,   v 

The  most  recent  tendency  of  the  Pole  is  to 
settle  on  the  abandoned  farms  of  the  East,  and 
in  the  main  they  are  farm  labourers  who  stayed 
with  the  native  farmers  as  long  as  they  oper- 
ated the  farms  and  in  the  meantime  had  saved 


FOREIGNERS  ON  THE  FARM     135 

up  enough  to  buy  the  place  when  the  owner 
decided  to  leave  it.  Most  of  the  recruits  are 
of  direct  immigration,  comparatively  few  of 
those  working  in  mines  and  factories  being  at- 
tracted to  the  farm.  Some  of  the  latter  class, 
however,  have  been  settling  on  the  poorer  hill 
farms  of  New  England,  attracted  thence  by 
enterprising  real  estate  agents  and  big  adver- 
tisements. They  have  been  especially  success-  { 
ful  on  farms  raising  specialized  crops.  In 
Portage  County,  Wis.,  they  grow  potatoes,/ 
while  in  New  England  they  usually  grow 
onions  or  tobacco  and  do  well  with  both.  The 
Pole  has  been  called  a  lover  of  the  land,  and 
he  never  is  quite  satisfied  when  he  is  not  the* 
owner  of  a  little  plat  of  it. 

More  than  a  third  of  all  our  Bohemian  popu-y 
lation  has  taken  to  the  farm,  and  the  Bohemian 
is  proving  to  more  southerly  sections  of  the 
country  what  the  Scandinavian  has  proved  to 
the  Northwest.  Texas  has  an  unusually  large 
number  of  Bohemian  farmers,  and  they  make 
good,  just  like  the  German  of  Pennsylvania 
and  the  states  on  the  eastern  side  of  the  Miss- 
issippi valley  has  made  good.  Most  of  them 
grow  cotton,  but  unlike  the  native  cotton 
grower,  they  raise  enough  of  other  crops  to 
supply  their  families  and  their  live  stock.  The 
Texas  situation  affords  a  present-day  picture 


130  THE  IMMIGRANT 

of  the  conditions  which  led  to  the  great  migra- 
tion from  Pennsylvania  and  northern  Virginia 
into  the  Middle  West — a  migration  that  carried 
with  it  the  father  and  mother  of  Abraham 
Lincoln.  The  old  settlers,  filled  with  the 
pioneer  spirit,  as  soon  as  population  began  to 
get  a  little  dense  and  land  values  began  to  rise, 
sold  out  at  good  prices  and  trekked  to  the  West. 
To-day  the  old  Bohemian  settler  in  eastern 
Texas,  willing  to  let  others  follow  the  easy 
life  of  settled  farming,  turns  his  eyes  toward 
the  Panhandle,  takes  his  family  and  goes  once 
more  to  the  frontier  to  grow  up  with  the  coun- 
try, and  to  add  to  wealth  through  the  enhance- 
ment of  land  values  as  well  as  through  the 
growing  of  crops.  The  Bohemian  farmer  of- 
Texas  has  proved  a  progressive  citizen,  hard- 
working, honest,  teaching  his  children  a  love 
for  the  farm,  and  growing  a  race  of  which 
Texas  is  proud. 

The  most  gratifying  result  of  a  study  of  the 
members  of  the  "  new  "  immigration  who  have 
gone  into  agriculture  is  that  it  reveals  a  second' 
generation  coming  on  that  is  as  well  American- 
ized as  the  Germans  of  Pennsylvania,  the 
Scandinavians  of  the  Northwest,  or  the  Scotch 
and  the  Irish  of  the  Middle  West.  It  demon- 
strates that  the  immigrant  who  settles  on  the 
land,  whether  he  be  of  the  "  old  "  or  the  "  new  " 


FOREIGNERS  ON  THE  FARM     137 

immigration,  will  sooner  or  later  enrich  the 
nation  with  a  posterity  that  is  a  tower  of* 
strength  and  a  great  economic  asset.  And  that 
lends  much  encouragement  to  the  efforts  of 
those  who  are  directing  the  attention  of  the 
immigrant  away  from  industrial  life  and  to- 
ward agricultural  life. 

An  interesting  type  of  immigrant  in  agricul- 
ture is  the  one  known  as  the  seasonal  labourer.* 
He  may  be  a  cranberry  picker  in  the  bogs  of 
New  England,  a  sugar-beet  worker  of  Wiscon- 
sin, or  a  strawberry  picker  of  Delaware  and 
New  Jersey.  Gradually  one  sees  the  older 
races  of  immigrants  giving  way  to  the  newer 
ones  in  these  fields  of  cheap  labour  as  well  as 
in  other  places.  The  native  Americans  and  the 
Germans  gave  way  to  the  South  Italians  in  the 
Jersey  berryfields,  while  in  the  Massachusetts 
cranberry  bogs,  the  Poles,  Finns,  and  Italians 
are  gradually  yielding  to  the  Black  Portuguese 
or  "  Bravas."  Near  Geneva,  N.  Y.,  the  South 
Italians  are  gradually  giving  way  to  the  Greeks, 
and  in  the  vicinity  of  Oneida,  N.  Y.,  the  Syrians 
are  getting  a  foothold  as  labourers  on  truck- 
farms.V 

On  the  whole,  the  showing  that  the  immi- 
grant of  the  present  day  is  able  to  make  when 
he  goes  on  the  land  is  not  a  bad  one.  One 
out  of  every  five  of  all  the  foreign-born  popula- 


138  THE  IMMIGRANT 

tion  in  the  United  States  lives  by  agriculture, 
but  this  large  ratio  is  due  to  the  "  old  "  immi- 
gration in  years  gone  by.  The  number  of  the 
"  new  "  immigration  on  the  land  is  compara- 
tively small,  but  the  conditions  are  good  enough) 
to  warrant  the  hope  that  it  eventually  will 
grow.  But  at  present  the  drift  is  plainly  to 
the  industrial  centres  and  to  city  pursuits  and 
somewhat  away  from  the  farm.  However,  it 
is  the  hope  of  many  of  the  states  which  have 
vacant  land  that  they  can  make  it  easy  for 
an  immigrant  with  ordinary  qualifications  to 
get  securely  settled  on  a  farm,  be  it  large  or 
small,  and  thus  turn  the  tide  back  to  the  land. 


XVII 

THE  CHILDREN  OF  IMMIGRANTS  IN 
SCHOOL 

THE  investigation  into  the  status  of  the 
children  of  immigrants  in  schools  was 
one  of  the  most  extensive  planned  and 
carried  out  by  the  Immigration  Commission. 
Inquiries  were  made  which  reached  more  than 
two  million  school-children,  approximately  a 
quarter  of  a  million  of  them  in  parochial, 
schools.  It  also  reached  some  fifty  thousand 
teachers  and  upward  of  thirty  thousand  stu- 
dents in  the  higher  educational  institutions  of 
the  country.  The  purpose  was  to  ascertain  to 
what  extent  the  children  of  foreign  parentage 
make  use  of  our  educational  system  and  what 
progress  they  make  in  school  work. 

In  the  main  the  survey  of  the  subject  was 
a  general  one,  but  in  a  number  of  cities  hav- 
ing a  large  percentage  of  children  of  foreign 
parentage,  the  examination  was  made  more 
in  detail.  More  than  half  of  all  the  school 
children  in  the  public  schools  of  the  thirty- 
seven  cities  investigated  were  of  foreign  par- 
139 


140  THE  IMMIGRANT 

entage.  In  fact,  fifty-seven  out  of  every  hun- 
dred of  the  children  were  of  foreign  parentage. 
Some  of  the  cities  showed  a  remarkable  propor- 
tion of  such  children.  In  Chelsea  and  Duluth 
it  was  nearly  three- fourths,  while  in  New 
York,  New  Bedford,  Chicago,  Fall  River,  and 
Shenandoah,  upward  of  two  out  of  three  were 
of  foreign  parentage. 

The  children  of  the  races  who  do  not  speak 
English  have  rather  a  hard  time  getting  started. 
There  are  a  few  exceptions.  For  instance,  in 
the  case  of  the  Swedes,  there  are  only  a  little 
more  than  half  as  many  of  their  children  be- 
hind in  their  studies  as  there  are  among  the 
native  American  children.  The  little  Dutch 
boys  and  girls  show  about  the  same  amount  of 
precocity.  But  when  it  comes  to  some  of  the 
other  nationalities  there  is  a  different  story. 
Two-thirds  of  the  Polish  Jew  children  have  an 
unequal  struggle  in  their  work,  while  nearly 
two-thirds  of  the  children  from  sunny  south- 
ern Italy  are  unable  to  keep  up  with  their 
American  fellow-pupils.  More  than  half  of 
the  Slovaks,  Magyars,  Poles,  North  Italians, 
and  Jews  are  behind  the  normal  qualifications 
of  their  years. 

And  yet  with  all  the  difficulties  experienced 
by  the  children  of  the  non-English-speaking 
foreigner,  they  show  a  better  percentage  of  pu- 


IMMIGRANT  SCHOOL  CHILDREN     141 

pils  measuring  up  to  the  average  school  stand- 
ards than  is  shown  by  the  American  negro. 
Whereas,  taking  them  as  a  whole,  the  non- 
English-speaking  foreigner's  children  show 
only  43  retarded  pupils  out  of  a  hundred,  the 
negro  children  show  69.  These  figures  are 
the  most  extensive  ever  brought  out  concern- 
ing the  relative  mentality  of  white  and  negro 
children,  and  have  added  interest  because  they 
come  from  thirty-seven  cities,  only  one  of 
which  is  south  of  the  Mason  and  Dixon 
line. 

The  teachers  in  the  schools  of  the  cities  in- 
vestigated ought  to  be  able  to  sympathize  with 
the  struggles  of  the  children  of  immigrants,  for 
it  is  shown  that  one-half  of  them  were  either 
immigrants  themselves  or  the  children  of  immi- 
grants. The  majority  of  these  teachers,  of 
course,  came  from  northwestern  Europe,  al- 
though other  races  were  not  without  repre- 
sentation. The  Irish  furnish  more  than  twice 
as  many  teachers  in  the  schools  investigated  as 
any  other  race.  In  fact,  they  furnish  about 
two-fifths  of  all  the  school  teachers  of  foreign 
parentage  in  those  cities — more  than  the  Ger- 
mans, English,  and  Scotch-Irish  together. 

In  the  parochial  schools  covered  by  the  in- 1 
vestigation  it  was  found  that  children  of  for- 
eign  parentage    largely   predominate,    nearly 


142  THE  IMMIGRANT 

two-thirds  answering  this  description.  One- 
fourth  of  them  are  of  Irish  parentage. 

One  can  scarcely  overestimate  the  assimila- 
tion force  of  the  public  schools  as  disclosed  by 
the  investigation.  It  shows  that  the  immi- 
grants do  not  fail  to  put  their  children  into  the* 
schools,  and  that  once  there  they  are  certain  to 
become  genuine  Americans  by  the  time  they 
leave  school.  We  discover  the  Americaniza- 
tion process  in  nearly  all  lines  of  inquiry  which 
might  indicate  it.  We  see  them  emulating  our 
bad  traits  as  well  as  good  ones. 

It  is  true,  however,  that  some  of  the  races 
from  southern  and  eastern  Europe  are  not  in- 
clined to  keep  their  children  in  school  as  longi 
as  would  be  best  for  them  and  for  the  country. 
While  one  out  of  eleven  of  our  native  American 
children  are  to  be  found  in  the  high  schools, 
only  one  out  of  a  hundred  of  the  average  of  the 
"  new "  immigrant's  children  will  be  found 
there. 

The  Immigration  Commission  finds  much 
cause  for  congratulation  on  the  way  the  for- 
eigner, generally  speaking,  takes  an  interest  in 
the  schools  and  is  ambitious  that  his  children 
should  learn  to  read  and  write.  While  in  the 
congested  districts  this  tendency  is  not  as 
marked  as  it  is  in  communities  having  only  a 
normal  foreign  population,  even  in  those  dis- 


IMMIGRANT  SCHOOL  CHILDREN     143 

tricts  the  children  are  given  at  least  an  ele- 
mentary education.  And  where  they  have 
grown  up  and  become  the  fathers  and  mothers 
of  children  of  their  own,  they  have  made  as 
good  a  record  as  the  native  Americans  in  the 
education  of  their  children. 

The  children  of  foreigners  in  the  smaller 
industrial  centres  do  not,  as  a  rule,  fare  so/ 
well  in  school  as  those  in  the  cities.  The  aver- 
age school  in  the  mining  village  or  camp  is  poor. 
Usually  it  is  not  in  session  more  than  five  or 
six  months  in  the  year,  and  when  it  is  in  ses- 
sion, the  teaching  is  often  of  a  decidedly  in- 
ferior quality.  And  then  there  are  no  attend- 
ance officers  to  look  to  keeping  the  children  in 
school.  A  mother,  burdened  with  a  house  full 
of  little  children,  and  perhaps  keeping  a  half- 
dozen  boarders,  very  naturally  is  inclined  to 
keep  her  girl  of  ten  home  to  help  her.  Like- 
wise, the  father,  desiring  to  supplement  his 
own  meagre  wages,  puts  his  boy  to  work  as 
soon  as  he  is  big  enough  to  pick  the  slate  out 
of  coal. 

The  child  of  the  immigrant  usually  starts 
out  in  life  with  a  valuable  asset — the  will  to 
overcome  the  obstacles  in  his  pathway.  The 
father  came  to  America  because  he  was  not/ 
satisfied.  He  bravely  bore  up  under  the  hard- 
ships and  privations  of  his  new  sphere  in  order 


144*  THE  IMMIGRANT 

that  he  and  his  family  might  be  better  off  in 
the  end.  He  worked  hard,  and  placed  every- 
thing else  secondary  to  his  desire  for  a  com- 
petence, measured  by  his  standard.  This  qual- 
ity is  inherited  by  the  children.  They  sing 
the  songs  of  the  street  more  earnestly,  play 
craps  more  recklessly,  swear  more  outrage- 
ously, and  do  almost  everything  else  with  a 
more  evident  ambition  to  excel  than  their  native 
American  companions. 

In  the  cities  the  children  of  the  immigrant 
usually  come  to  school  from  a  crowded  tene- 
ment. The  Immigration  Commission  could  not 
find  a  single  tenement  block  occupied  by  Ameri-i 
cans  of  native  parentage.  Those  apologies  for 
human  habitations  are  occupied  by  the  immi- 
grant and  his  children.  They  are  not  there  be- 
cause they  prefer  it,  but  because  sheer  neces- 
sity forces  them  to  be  there.  With  no  place 
to  play  except  in  a  slum  alley,  it  must  be  re- 
freshing to  the  children  to  go  to  school  where 
for  at  least  a  part  of  the  day  they  may  live 
amid  decent  surroundings  and  have  a  good 
place  to  play  during  recess. 

Sometimes  teachers  have  found  the  children 
of  immigrants  eager  to  play  but  very  reluctant 
to  wash.  One  teacher  encountering  this  dispo- 
sition told  the  boys  that  they  could  play  in  the 
gymnasium  on  condition  that  they  first  used  its 


IMMIGRANT  SCHOOL  CHILDREN     145 

shower-baths.  The  desire  to  play  overbalanced 
the  disinclination  to  wash,  and  a  clean  lot  of 
boys  was  the  result.  In  one  of  the  New  York 
schools  there  was  a  boy  who  would  frequently 
jump  out  of  his  seat,  make  funny  gestures,  and 
go  through  other  puzzling  performances.  The 
teacher  tried  to  break  him  of  his  habit,  but 
without  success.  Later  the  mother  told  her 
the  boy  was  crazy  for  gymnastic  exer- 
cises. 

The  problem  of  the  working  boy  is  one  of* 
the  hardest  with  which  those  who  would  edu- 
cate the  child  of  the  immigrant  have  to  contend. 
Thousands  of  these  boys  come  to  America  when 
they  are  too  old  to  enter  the  primary  grades. 
If  he  does  try  to  enter  those  grades  he  is  so 
big  that  he  is  laughed  at  and  drops  out  rather 
than  continue  to  be  the  butt  of  the  children's 
laughter.  So  he  gets  no  education.  The  same 
is  largely  true  of  the  boys  born  here  but  forced 
to  work  as  soon  as  they  are  old  enough. 

The  investigations  that  have  been  made  by 
various  agencies  tend  to  show  that  there  is 
a  markedly  greater  tendency  to  crime  among 
the  children  of  foreign  parentage  than  among, 
those  of  native  parentage.  The  experience  of 
the  secretary  of  the  Playground  Association  of 
Maiden,  Mass.,  perhaps  explains  why  this  is 


146  THE  IMMIGRANT 

so.  He  found  that  as  soon  as  the  playground 
was  opened  and  the  boys  of  foreign  parentage 
brought  out  of  the  alleys  and  given  healthy 
amusements,  the  number  of  petty  crimes  com- 
mitted by  them  fell  off  fully  fifty  per  cent. 

It  is  clear,  then,  that  the  problem  of  correct- 
ing the  criminal  tendencies  among  certain  of 
our  immigrant  classes  cannot  be  left  to  any 
test  that  may  be  imposed  at  Ellis  Island — nor 
can  it  be  solved  by  devising  punishments!  We 
must  Americanize  their  children,  and  to  do 
that  we  must  give  them  their  share  of  the 
American  boy's  rightful  heritage — a  due  pro- 
portion of  healthy  fun. 


XVIII 
IMMIGRANTS  AND  CRIME 

THE  American  people  have  heard  so  much 
about  the  criminal  tendencies  of  the 
"  new "  immigration  that  they  have 
come  generally  to  accept  as  gospel  truth  the 
oft-repeated  statement  that  the  aliens  coming  to 
America  are  distinguished  for  their  criminal 
tendencies.  And  yet  every  investigation  that 
has  been  made  points  to  the  conclusion  that 
if  there  is  any  difference  between  the  immigrant 
and  the  native  American  in  this  regard  it  is  in 
favour  of  the  foreigner  rather  than  against 
him.  » 

The  statistics  do  indicate,  however,  that  thei 
American-born  children  of  immigrants  show 
a  greater  tendency  to  crime  than  do  the  chil- 
dren of  native  parentage.  It  also  appears  that 
juvenile  delinquency  is  greater  among  the  chil- 
dren of  immigrants  than  among  those  of  native 
parents.  The  Immigration  Commission  con- 
cludes from  its  investigations  that,  upon  the 
whole  broad  question  as  to  whether  or  not  im- 
migration increases  crime,  there  is  not  sufficient 
147 


148  THE  IMMIGRANT 

evidence  upon  which  to  predicate  a  conclusion. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  has  found  enough  evi- 
dence to  justify  the  assertion  that  immigration 
does  change  the  character  of  crime  in  this 
country,  and  says  that  to  measure  this  change 
was  the  chief  aim  of  the  investigation  of  crime 
records. 

A  marked  increase  in  the  number  of  crimes 
of  personal  violence,  such  as  abduction,  kid- 
napping, assault,  homicide,  and  rape,  is  noted, 
and  the  number  of  cases  of  disorderly  conduct, 
drunkenness,  vagrancy,  and  like  offenses  has 
increased  largely  as  a  result  of  the  presence 
of  the  immigrant.  The  same  is  true  of  offences 
against  chastity,  and  also  of  the  prevalence  of 
blackmail,  extortion,  and  the  receiving  of  stolen 
property.  On  the  other  hand,  in  the  majority 
of  the  gainful  offences  the  native  American  has 
a  worse  record  than  the  immigrant. 

Some  of  these  changes  in  the  nature  of 
American  crime  are  traceable  largely  to  certain 
nationalities  of  immigrants.  For  instance,  the 
Commission  concludes  that  the  increase  in  the 
number  of  offenses  of  personal  violence  in  this 
country  is  due  to  the  immigration  from  south- 
ern Europe  in  general,  and  from  Italy  in  par- 
ticular. The  Irish  and  Scotch  are  notable  for 
their  penal  records  for  intoxication,  the  Italian 
for  his  number  of  attempted  homicides,  and 


IMMIGRANTS  AND  CRIME        149 

the  Greeks  and  Russians  for  their  contempt  of 
public  ordinances  in  the  big  cities.    - 

But  a  much  larger  proportion  of  the  offences 
committed  by  native  Americans  are  of  a  serious 
nature  than  among  those  committed  by  the  im- 
migrants. For  instance,  the  census  inquiry 
shows  that  seven  out  of  every  ten  crimes  com- 
mitted by  native  American  prisoners  are  "  ma- 
jor "  offences,  while  less  than  six  out  of  ten 
committed  by  immigrant  prisoners  belonged 
to  that  category. 

.  Perhaps  the  most  interesting  tendency  dis- 
closed by  the  investigation  is  the  inclination  of^ 
the  children  of  foreigners  to  cease  to  commit 
the  crimes  which  characterize  their  parents  and 
to  commit  the  kinds  of  crimes  which  character- 
ize the  native  American  population — showing 
that  they  imitate  Americans  with  a  vengeance. 
In  the  records  of  the  Court  of  General  Sessions 
of  New  York  it  was  found  that  whereas  the 
percentage  of  gainful  offences  committed  by 
Irish  immigrants  was  only  60.5  per  cent,  the 
second  generation  shows  78  per  cent,  and  the 
native  Americans  79.7  per  cent.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  children  of  Irish  immigrants  commit 
less  than  half  as  many  offences  of  personal  vio- 
lence as  did  their  fathers.    — 

There  are  some  thirteen  thousand  alien  pris- 
oners in  the  penal  institutions  of  the  United 


150  THE  IMMIGRANT 

States.  Assuming  that  it  costs  only  $200  a 
year  to  maintain  each  of  them,  the  country 
must  spend  over  two  and  a  half  million  dollars 
annually  to  keep  them.  One-fourth  of  their 
crimes  were  committed  within  three  years  after 
their  arrival  in  the  United  States.  It  is  inter- 
esting to  note  the  tendency  of  certain  nationali- 
'  ties  to  commit  certain  forms  of  crime.  Half 
of  the  crimes  committed  by  Italians  were  of  per- 
sonal violence,  while  crimes  of  this  class  were 
committed  by  only  one-sixteenth  of  the  Jewish 
prisoners.  On  the  other  hand,  the  Jews  com- 
mitted nearly  twice  as  many  gainful  offences 
as  did  the  Italians.  Two-thirds  of  the  offences 
of  which  Irish  prisoners  were  convicted  were 
against  public  policy,  while  the  Germans  com- 
mitted much  less  than  half  as  many  such  crimes. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Germans  committed 
more  than  twice  as  many  gainful  offences  as 
the  Irish.  And  so  go  the  proportions  all  down 
the  line.  One  nationality  makes  but  few  mur- 
derers, yet  it  has  many  forgers,  burglars,  and 
thieves.  Another  nationality  has  many  men 
who  commit  or  attempt  to  commit  murder,  and 
yet  is  possessed  of  only  a  few  forgers,  thieves, 
and  burglars. 

The  distorted  idea  of  the  average  American 
citizen  concerning  the  criminal  tendencies  of 
immigrants  is  probably  explained  by  the  fact 


IMMIGRANTS  AND  CRIME        151 

that  such  a  large  number  of  them  are  convicted 
of  petty  offences.  The  New  York  State  Com- 
mission of  Immigration  says  they  violate  the 
corporation  ordinances  and  the  sanitary  code 
to  a  much  larger  extent  than  the  native  Ameri- 
can. For  instance,  a  majority  of  the  criminal- 
ity of  the  Greeks  of  New  York  is  found  to 
be  a  violation  of  the  law  against  peddling  with- 
out license. 

Much  of  the  crime  among  immigrants  is  the 
direct  result  of  drunkenness,  and  this  particu- 
larly explains  why  the  number  of  crimes  of 
personal  violence  among  the  immigrants  from 
southern  and  eastern  Europe  is  so  large.  Withf 
such  a  large  percentage  of  them  unmarried  and 
living  in  boarding-houses  where  often  from 
four  to  ten  sleep  in  a  single  room,  it  is  little 
wonder  that  they  often  drink  to  excess,  and  of 
course  they  drink  cheap  liquor  calculated  to 
arouse  all  the  worst  that  is  in  them.  The  for- 
eigner often  attempts  to  hide  the  crime  of  his 
own  people,  although  it  may  have  been  com--' 
mitted  against  himself.  It  has  been  estimated 
that  not  more  than  three  per  cent  of  all  those 
who  commit  murder  are  brought  to  justice. 

The  Immigration  Commission  investigated 
the  tendency  of  foreign  criminals  to  come  to  the 
United  States  in  order  to  escape  punishment, 
and  the  results  show  the  inadequacy  of  the 


152  THE  IMMIGRANT 

present  law  to  debar  them.  Italy  was  selected 
as  the  country  upon  whose  subjects  the  in- 
vestigation was  to  be  made,  largely  because  of 
the  general  belief  that  more  Italian  criminals 
come  to  the  United  States  than  from  any  other 
country.  The  investigation  was  made  in  New 
York  for  the  reason  that  it  could  be  carried  on 
to  better  advantage  there,  both  because  of  the 
Italians  in  the  city  and  because  suspicions  would 
not  be  as  likely  to  be  aroused.  To  conduct 
the  investigation  it  was  necessary  to  secure  a 
corps  of  special  agents  who  were  familiar  with 
the  Italian  quarter.  It  was  then  further  neces- 
sary to  check  up  the  accuracy  of  their  work 
by  securing  the  official  records  of  the  criminals 
they  had  run  down  and  reported  upon.  The 
closeness  with  which  the  reports  of  the  investi- 
gators tallied  with  the  facts  disclosed  by  the 
official  records  sent  over  from  Italy,  proved 
conclusively  the  carefulness  of  the  investiga- 
tors in  ascertaining  and  reporting  their  facts. 
It  was  found  that  there  are  many  Italian 
criminals  in  the  United  States  who  served  out 
their  sentences  before  coming;  many  others 
who  were  tried  and  convicted  in  their  absence 
and  are  fugitives  from  justice;  many  who  were 
acquitted,  but  against  whom  there  was  strong 
evidence ;  and  still  others  who  never  have  been 
tried  for  any  crime  but  whose  reputations  at 


IMMIGRANTS  AND  CRIME        153 

home  were  notorious.  The  law  shuts  out  only  I 
the  one  class — those  who  have  been  tried  and 
convicted  before  their  arrival  in  the  United 
States.  There  have  been  instances  where  the 
Italian  courts  have  convicted  a  criminal  after 
his  landing  in  the  United  States,  but  the  courts 
have  held  that  the  law  does  not  require  the  de- 
portation of  such  persons.  Furthermore,  no 
matter  how  clear  the  evidence  that  a  criminal 
got  into  the  United  States  in  defiance  of  the 
immigration  laws,  the  courts  have  held  that  if 
he  has  been  here  three  years  he  is  not  subject  to 
deportation. 

It  has  been  urged  in  many  quarters  that 
every  person  who  has  committed  a  criminal 
offence  abroad  should  be  liable  to  deportation 
at  any  time  within  a  period  of  five  years,  and 
also  that  any  immigrant  committing  a  criminal 
offence  within  five  years  after  coming  here 
shall  be  deported  immediately.  Some  have  sug- 
gested that  every  person  who  lands  ought  to 
be  required  to  present  a  certificate  of  good 
standing  from  his  home  country.  As  it  is,  the 
immigration  authorities  have  very  little  ground 
upon  which  to  work  in  trying  to  prevent  the 
entrance  of  criminals.  Unless  there  are  pecu- 
liar circumstances  the  criminal  is  usually 
shrewd  enough  to  hide  any  indications  of  his 
criminalities,  and  so  he  comes  in. 


154  THE  IMMIGRANT 

General  Theodore  A.  Bingham  said,  when 
Police  Commissioner  of  New  York,  that 
he  believed  there  were  fully  three  thousand 
desperadoes  from  southern  Italy  alone  in  *that 
city,  and  that  among  them  there  were  some  as 
ferocious  and  desperate  as  ever  gathered  in  a 
modern  city  in  time  of  peace — mediaeval  crimi- 
nals who  must  be  dealt  with  under  modern 
laws. 

That  this  condition  greatly  complicates  the 
difficulties  of  police  supervision  in  the  metropo- 
lis cannot  be  denied.  It  is,  therefore,  the  more 
unfortunate  that  so  many  criminals  of  foreign 
extraction  have  found  not  opposition  but  en- 
couragement from  those  whose  duty  it  is  to 
keep  order.  The  "  Black  Hand "  outrages 
among  the  Italians,  the  Tong  wars  among  the 
Chinese,  the  "  razor  parties  "  among  the  ne- 
groes of  San  Juan  Hill,  when  considered  with 
the  "  gang "  wars  of  the  native  Americans 
may  be  taken  as  showing  that  crime  is  neither 
geographical  nor  racial. 


id 


K 


*'H 


XIX 

THE  WHITE  SLAVE  TRAFFIC 

THE  importation  and  harbouring  of  alien 
women  and  girls  for  immoral  purposes, 
is  pronounced  by  the  Immigration  Com- 
mission the  most  pitiful  and  the  most  revolting 
phase  of  the  immigration  question.  It  was 
found  that  the  business  had  assumed  such  large 
proportions  and  was  exerting  so  evil  an  influ- 
ence upon  the  country  that  the  Commission 
decided  to  make  it  the  subject  of  a  thorough 
investigation.  Since  the  subject  is  one  espe- 
cially liable  to  sensational  exploitation,  the 
Commission  decided  that  it  would  carefully 
state  only  the  undeniable  facts  calculated  to 
form  the  basis  of  reasonable  legislative  and 
administrative  action  looking  to  its  suppression. 
The  Commission  made  its  report  to  Congress 
just  before  Christmas,  1909.  The  showing  made 
was  so  startling  that  Congress  in  a  little  more 
than  three  months  after  the  filing  of  the  report, 
sent  a  law  upon  the  subject  to  the  President 
for  his  signature.  This  law  added  to  the  list 
of  deportable  aliens  persons  who  are  sup- 
155 


156  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ported  by,  or  who  receive  in  whole  or  in  part, 
the  proceeds  of  prostitution.  This  was  in- 
tended especially  to  break  up  the  infamous 
cadet  system,  whereby  human  vampires  in  the 
guise  of  men  force  women  and  girls  to  deliver 
to  them  the  profits  of  their  shame.  The  law  of 
1907  already  had  placed  the  ban  upon  aliens 
who  procure  or  attempt  to  bring  women  and 
girls  into  the  United  States  for  immoral  pur- 
poses, but  it  was  not  extended  to  the  repre- 
hensible cadet. 

The  investigation  of  the  white  slave  traffic 
began  in  1907,  under  the  active  supervision  of 
a  special  committee  of  the  Immigration  Com- 
mission. The  work  was  conducted  by  a  special 
agent  with  numerous  assistants,  and  the  Com- 
mission says  that  too  much  credit  cannot  be 
given  to  the  agents  who  independently  planned 
details,  and  with  cheerful  courage,  even  at  the 
risk  of  their  lives  at  times,  secured  information 
relative  to  the  traffic.  Several  of  them  had  to 
associate,  under  one  pretext  or  another,  with 
the  criminal  procurers,  importers,  cadets,  and 
their  unfortunate  or  degraded  victims  when 
the  discovery  of  the  agent's  purposes  might 
have  resulted  in  his  murder.  One  woman 
agent  was  attacked  and  beaten,  escaping  seri- 
ous injury,  if  not  death,  only  with  the  greatest 
difficulty,  and  yet  the  next  day  she  went  cheer- 


THE  WHITE  SLAVE  TRAFFIC     157 

fully  back  to  her  work,  though,  of  course,  in 
another  locality.  Information  was  secured 
from  men  who  formerly  had  been  keepers  of 
disorderly  houses;  from  women  who  were 
managers  of  such  houses;  from  physicians  who 
practised  among  such  women;  from  women 
who  had  formerly  been  white  slaves;  and  also 
from  some  of  the  women  and  girls  who  had 
been  lured  to  America  under  false  pretences. 

After  its  investigation,  the  Commission  esti- 
mated that  the  number  of  women  imported  for 
immoral  purposes  was  running  into  the  thou- 
sand every  year.  But  the  real  work  was  to  get 
data  as  to  the  methods  of  the  white  slave  traffic 
so  that  the  remedial  legislation  could  be 
adopted.  The  action  of  the  Supreme  Court  in 
the  Keller  case,  in  which  that  part  of  the  law 
under  which  persons  were  prosecuted  for  "  har- 
bouring "  alien  women  for  immoral  purposes 
was  declared  unconstitutional,  has  made  it 
harder  to  enforce  the  intent  of  the  law,  since 
it  is  much  more  difficult  to  weave  a  chain  of 
evidence  about  an  importer  or  procurer  than  to 
convict  a  person  of  "  harbouring "  such 
women. 

Some  idea  of  the  prevalence  of  "  white  slav- 
ery "  in  New  York  City  may  be  gathered  from 
an  investigation  of  the  night  court  records  for 
a  period  of  four  months.     During  that  time 


) 


158  THE  IMMIGRANT 

there  were  2,093  cases  of  soliciting  on  the 
streets  and  being  inmates  of  disorderly  houses 
brought  in,  upon  which  convictions  were  se- 
^*  cured,  and  of  these  581  were  women  of  alien 
birth.  Nearly  half  of  the  foreigners  were 
Jewish,  while  half  of  the  remainder  were 
French.  The  opinions  of  the  agents  of  the 
Commission,  however,  were  that  the  majority 
of  the  Jewish  women  found  in  white  slavery 
had  reached  there  at  the  hands  of  professional 
seducers. 

The  motive  of  business  profit  is  wholly  re- 
sponsible for  the  existence  of  the  traffic.  The 
Commission  states  that  the  procurers  who  en- 
tice the  women  to  leave  their  foreign  homes,  the 
importers  who  assist  them  in  evading  the  law 
or  who  bring  them  here  for  sale  to  the  keepers 
of  disorderly  houses,  and  cadets  who  exploit 
them  body  and  soul,  have  only  profit  in  view. 
Although  very  many  of  the  girls  are  brought 
here  innocent,  betrayed  into  a  slavery  rigid 
in  its  strictness  and  barbarous  in  its  nature, 
there  are  others  who  come  with  their  eyes  open, 
lured  by  stories  that  the  profits  of  such  a  life 
are  often  ten  times  as  great  in  America  as  in 
Europe. 

The  Commission  says  that  of  far  greater 
significance  than  facts  showing  that  the  law 
has  been  violated,  are  the  other  facts  which 


THE  WHITE  SLAVE  TRAFFIC     159 

show  the  method  employed  and  the  inadequacy 
of  the  law  to  protect  the  country  against  such 
importations.  Recruiting  is  carried  on  sys- 
tematically at  home  and  abroad.  The  men  who 
recruit  the  majority  of  the  victims  are  in  the 
business  for  the  dollars  and  cents  they  can  get 
out  of  it.  With  a  cunning  knowledge  of  human 
nature,  they  play  upon  the  weaknesses  of  van- 
ity and  pride,  upon  the  laudable  thrift  and 
desire  to  secure  a  better  livelihood,  upon  the 
praiseworthy  trust  and  affection  which  inno- 
cent girls  have  for  those  they  love.  They  even 
prey  upon  their  sentiments  of  religion,  and  once 
in  their  toils,  they  capitalize  them  with  a  cruelty 
at  times  fiendish  in  its  calculating  coldness  and 
brutality.  If  the  prospective  victim  is  young 
and  affectionate,  the  procurer  makes  her  ac- 
quaintance, treats  her  kindly,  offers  to  assist 
her  in  getting  a  better  position.  Her  confi- 
dence won,  she  is  within  his  power,  and  is  cal- 
culatingly led  into  a  life  of  shame.  Women 
procurers  offer  girls  good  positions  at  better 
pay  than  they  have  ever  been  able  to  make, 
and  then  carry  them  off  to  some  brothel. 

Correspondence  captured  in  raids  instituted 
by  the  agents  of  the  Commission  constitute 
remarkable  human  documents.  The  slavers 
write  to  one  another  in  polite  terms,  express 
affection  for  their  families,  talk  tenderly  of 


160  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  mothers  and  other  relatives,  and  yet  when 
they  come  to  discuss  their  victims  it  is  with 
the  same  coolness  with  which  they  would  name 
the  good  points  of  a  thoroughbred  horse  or  a 
blooded  dog  which  they  were  offering  for  sale. 
A  Seattle  case  reveals  something  of  the 
methods  of  the  slavers.  The  girl  was  German. 
She  served  four  years  as  a  trained  nurse  and 
then  went  to  France  for  a  year  as  governess, 
after  which  she  spent  a  year  at  home.  Finally 
she  decided  to  come  to  America.  En  route  she 
met  another  German  woman,  who  told  her  she 
lived  in  Los  Angeles,  and  who  wanted  to  en- 
gage her  as  governess.  Finally  they  wound  up 
in  Seattle,  where  she  was  taken,  at  night,  to 
a  disorderly  house  whose  address  she  did  not 
know,  where  her  clothes  were  taken  from  her 
and  where  she  was  denied  paper  to  write.  She 
threatened  to  kill  herself  if  she  were  not  re- 
leased, and  finally  she  was  taken  to  a  hotel,  by 
the  husband  of  the  woman  who  had  enticed 
her,  and  was  there  bound,  gagged,  and  as- 
saulted. The  law  finally  came  to  her  rescue 
and  the  woman  who  betrayed  her  was  deported. 
Her  husband  got  two  years  in  the  penitentiary, 
but  under  the  Supreme  Court  decision  pro- 
nouncing unconstitutional  the  law  against  har- 
bouring, he  is  not  liable  to  any  punishment  for 
his  unspeakably  brutal  treatment  of  his  vicl 


THE  WHITE  SLAVE  TRAFFIC     161 

Those  who  recruit  women  for  immoral  pur- 
poses frequent  employment  agencies,  immi- 
grant homes,  moving-picture  shows,  dance- 
halls,  railroad  stations.  Often  as  much  as  a 
thousand  dollars  is  paid  for  an  exceptionally 
attractive  girl,  and  the  prices  range  on  down 
to  two  hundred  dollars.  The  imported  girls 
usually  come  as  the  wives  or  relatives  of  the 
men  accompanying  them,  as  maids  or  relatives 
of  women  accompanying  them,  or  as  women 
entering  alone  and  booked  to  some  home  or 
friend.  The  Japanese  have  a  custom  whereby 
a  woman  in  Japan  may  marry  a  man  in  America 
by  proxy,  and  often  they  come  over  ostensibly 
to  meet  their  proxy  husbands,  but  in  reality  to 
go  into  "  white  slavery." 

It  has  been  found  difficult  to  apprehend  the 
violators  of  the  white  slave  law  at  the  ports, 
and  the  danger  of  detaining  innocent  women  is 
so  great  that  the  inspectors  would  rather  pass 
a  dozen  they  are  not  certain  about  than  to  hold 
up  one  innocent  one  upon  such  a  charge. 

The  system  of  exploitation  is  such  that  the 
poor  white  slave  victim,  whether  she  has  been 
trapped  into  the  life  or  has  entered  it  willingly, 
gets  only  a  small  share  of  the  profit.  In  a  raid 
in  Chicago  a  big  Irish  girl  was  taken.  She  was 
asked  why  she  didn't  get  out.  She  replied: 
"  Get  out !     I  can't.    They  make  us  buy  the 


162  THE  IMMIGRANT 

cheapest  rags,  and  they  are  charged  against  us 
at  fabulous  prices;  they  make  us  change  outfits 
every  two  or  three  weeks,  until  we  are  so 
deeply  in  debt  we  can  never  hope  to  get  out. 
We  seldom  get  an  accounting,  but  when  we 
do  it  is  always  to  find  ourselves  deeper  in  debt 
than  before.,, 

One  depressing  fact  about  this  unhappy  busi- 
ness is  that  so  many  honest  immigrant  girls 
who  actually  seek  and  find  employment  in 
domestic  service  subsequently  become  the  prey 
of  the  "  white  slaver."  The  changed  conditions 
of  life  that  they  find  in  America,  the  abso- 
lute extinction  in  many  instances  of  the  so- 
cial opportunities,  make  them  only  too  ready 
for  the  wiles  of  the  miserable  creatures  who 
ever  stalk  the  defenceless  and  the  weak. 


XX 

THE  FOREIGNER'S  LARGE  FAMILY 

MUCH  has  been  written  in  recent  years 
about  race  suicide,  but  most  of  it 
with  only  superficial  facts  at  hand 
upon  which  to  base  conclusions.  Next  to  noth- 
ing was  known  of  the  conditions  which  produce 
it,  of  its  relative  extent  in  urban  and  rural 
life,  and  of  its  existence  among  different  na- 
tionalities of  people.  Fortunately,  when  the 
Twelfth  Census  was  taken,  data  were  gathered 
as  to  the  number  of  years  wives  had  been  mar- 
ried and  the  number  of  children  they  had  borne. 
But  these  figures  were  never  tabulated  by  the 
Census  authorities  with  a  view  to  showing  the 
bearing  immigration  has  upon  the  tendency  of 
the  American  people  toward  a  lower  birth-rate. 
That  task  was  undertaken  by  the  Immigration 
Commission  with  data  taken  from  the  state  of 
Rhode  Island  as  representing  a  compactly  popu- 
lated state  of  the  old  East  where  nearly  all 
the  people  are  urban  dwellers;  from  the  city 
of  Cleveland  as  being  a  typical  American  city; 
from  the  rural  counties  of  Ohio  representing 
163 


164  THE  IMMIGRANT 

typical  rural  conditions  among  the  native  popu- 
lation; from  the  city  of  Minneapolis  represent- 
ing the  old  immigration  under  urban  condi- 
tions ;  and  from  the  rural  districts  of  Minnesota 
as  typical  of  the  Northwest. 

The  results  of  these  tabulations  demonstrate 
beyond  question  that  if  America  is  to  continue 
to  grow  and  wax  more  powerful  it  will  have 
to  look  to  the  country  districts  and  to  the  im- 
migrants for  the  supply  of  children  who  will 
make  this  growth  possible.  The  story  told  by 
the  figures  is  one  of  very  small  families  among 
women  of  native  parentage  who  live  under 
urban  conditions.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  such 
families  scarcely  have  enough  children  to  re- 
place themselves.  It  is  probable  that  out  of 
every  three  children  born  not  more  than  two 
grow  to  adult  estate  and  have  children  of  their 
own.  In  fact,  the  probability  is  that  this  state- 
ment is  far  on  the  side  of  conservatism,  as  is 
shown  by  the  fact  that  out  of  100,000  children 
born,  about  40,000  die  before  they  reach  the 
age  of  twenty- four.  And  when  it  is  further 
considered  that  out  of  every  hundred  marriages 
in  the  country  about  seven  are  childless,  it  will 
appear  very  conservative  to  say  that  the  family 
which  does  not  have  three  children  stands  little 
show  of  directly  adding  to  the  permanent 
population  of  the  country. 


A  FOREIGNER'S  LARGE  FAMILY     165 

And  yet  the  investigations  of  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission  disclose  the  fact  that  the  aver- 
age American  wife  whose  parents  are  both 
native-born  Americans,  and  who  lives  in  the 
city,  has  only  2.4  children.  Her  sister  in  the 
rural  districts  has  3.4  children,  or  one  more 
child  than  her  city  sister.  To  put  it  another 
way,  where  city  women  of  native  parentage 
have  twenty-four  children,  their  country  sis- 
ters have  thirty-four. 

But  although  the  country  woman  of  native 
parentage  has  one  more  child  in  her  family 
than  her  city  sister,  the  immigrant  mother 
shows  even  a  larger  family  than  the  country 
woman.  The  immigrant  woman  in  the  city  has 
a  larger  number  of  children  than  the  native 
parentage  woman  in  the  country,  but  fewer 
children  than  the  immigrant  woman  in  the 
country.  The  latter  class  of  women  has  the 
largest  number  of  children  of  any  of  the  classes 
of  women  investigated.  In  rural  Minnesota 
we  find  her  with  an  average  of  five  and  a  half 
children. 

In  nearly  every  case  women  of  foreign  birth 
show  a  much  higher  percentage  of  children 
than  women  who  are  the  children  of  native 
Americans.  For  all  the  territory  studied  the 
immigrant  women  had  an  average  of  two  chil- 
dren more  than  the  native  women  of  native 


166  THE  IMMIGRANT 

parentage.  The  French  Canadian  women  in 
Rhode  Island  had  families  more  than  twice 
as  large  as  the  women  of  native  American  par- 
entage, and  very  few  of  the  immigrant  women 
of  the  different  nationalities  failed  to  show  at 
least  two  children  more  than  the  average 
American  woman  could  claim.  The  English 
and  Scotch  came  nearer  to  approximating  the 
American  standard  than  any  other  immigrant 
races,  and  yet  average  English  and  Scotch 
mothers  had  one  more  child  than  the  American- 
parentage  mothers. 

The  Polish  women  embraced  in  the  enumera- 
tion, had  the  champion  anti-race  suicide  fami- 
lies in  the  United  States,  with  more  than  six 
children  to  the  family.  The  Bohemian  women 
had  more  than  five  children  in  the  average 
family,  and  the  same  is  true  of  the  French 
Canadians,  the  Finnish,  and  the  Russian 
women.  The  Austrian,  Danish,  German,  Irish, 
Italian,  Norwegian,  and  Swiss  women  who 
were  immigrants,  averaged  more  than  four  and 
a  half  children  each. 

But  the  children  of  the  immigrant  women 
are  not  the  possessors  of  as  big  families  as 
their  mothers.  While  the  immigrant  women 
themselves  average  4.7  children,  their  daugh- 
ters who  have  been  married  the  same  length 
of    time    average    only    3.9    children.     The 


A  FOREIGNER'S  LARGE  FAMILY     167 

tendency  of  the  daughters  of  immigrant  women 
toward  smaller  families  applies  to  every  na- 
tionality. While  among  none  of  the  nationali- 
ties investigated  did  the  daughters  of  immigrant 
women  have  as  many  children  as  the  mother, 
on  the  other  hand,  in  not  a  single  nationality 
did  the  average  number  of  children  among 
women  of  immigrant  parentage  fall  as  low  as 
that  among  women  of  native  parentage.  Usu- 
ally the  family  of  the  immigrant  woman's 
daughter  was  a  medium  between  the  big  family 
of  the  immigrant  woman  and  the  small  one 
of  the  woman  of  native  parentage. 

These  figures  are  all  based  upon  women  who 
are  less  than  forty-five  years  old  and  who  have 
been  married  from  ten  to  nineteen  years.  No 
matter  whether  the  figures  are  taken  from 
populous  Rhode  Island,  from  rural  Minnesota, 
rural  Ohio,  Cleveland,  or  Minneapolis,  they 
all  show  the  same  relative  tendencies  of  large 
families  among  the  women  of  foreign  birth, 
medium  families  among  women  who  are  the 
daughters  of  immigrants,  and  smaller  families 
among  women  of  native  parentage'.  The  aver- 
age city-living  daughter  of  an  immigrant 
woman  has  about  the  same-sized  family  as  the 
average  country-living  woman  of  native  par- 
entage. 


168  THE  IMMIGRANT 

No  matter  among  what  class  or  what  nation- 
ality of  women  the  investigation  leads,  the 
uniform  lesson  it  teaches  is  that  urban  condi- 
tions tend  to  restrict  the  size  of  families.  They 
affect  the  woman  of  native  parentage  most  of 
all,  then  the  women  of  native  birth  but  im- 
migrant parentage,  and  least  of  all  the  immi- 
grant woman  herself. 

Not  only  do  city  conditions  tend  to  cut  down 
the  size  of  the  average  family,  but  they  tend 
to  produce  a  large  number  of  childless  mar- 
riages. For  instance,  in  Rhode  Island  one 
married  woman  out  of  every  six  who  has  been 
married  more  than  ten  years  and  whose  parents 
are  native  born,  has  had  no  children.  In  Cleve- 
land the  ratio  is  about  one  out  of  seven,  and 
in  Minneapolis  it  is  about  one  out  of  eight. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  women  of  native  par- 
entage in  the  rural  districts  of  Ohio  and  Minne- 
sota show  only  one  marriage  out  of  twenty 
without  children. 

Here  again  the  immigrant  woman  excels  her 
daughters  and  the  daughters  of  native  Ameri- 
can parents.  In  Rhode  Island  only  one  mar- 
ried immigrant  woman  in  fifteen  has  had  no 
children,  in  Cleveland  one  in  nineteen,  in 
Minneapolis  one  in  sixteen,  and  in  the  rural 
districts  it  is  about  one  in  twenty.  And  here 
again  the  daughters  of  the  immigrant  women 


A  FOREIGNER'S  LARGE  FAMILY     169 

fall  between  their  mothers  and  the  women  of 
native  American  parentage. 

It  is  also  interesting  to  note  how  much  less  is 
the  average  difference  of  the  ages  of  the  children 
of  immigrant  parentage  than  of  native  Ameri- 
can stock.  The  native  American  woman  of  na- 
tive parentage  has  had  a  child  for  every  five 
years  and  four  months  of  her  married  life,  while 
the  immigrant  woman  has  had  one  for  every 
three  years  she  has  been  married.  Here  again 
the  native-parentage,  city-living  wife  shows  the 
greatest  tendency  to  race  suicide,  while  her 
country-living  sister,  though  not  receiving  as 
frequent  visits  from  the  stork  as  the  immigrant 
woman  and  her  daughter,  does  have  more 
children  than  her  sister  in  the  city. 

A  careful  study  of  the  figures  presented  by 
the  Immigration  Commission,  taken  in  con- 
junction with  the  statistics  of  birth-  and  death- 
rates  available  in  the  United  States,  indicates 
that  if  America  were  dependent  for  her  future 
population  upon  the  American  woman  who 
lives  in  the  city  and  whose  parents  were  native 
born,  there  would  be  a  decline  in  population 
from  decade  to  decade.  It  also  indicates  that  if 
immigration  should  cease  and  the  birth-rate  of 
all  American  women  of  native  parentage  should 
be  continued,  we  would  just  a  little  more  than 
hold  our  own  in  population.     On  the  other 


170  THE  IMMIGRANT 

hand,  with  the  large  number  of  immigrant 
women  coming  to  America  and  the  partiality 
of  the  stork  for  their  homes  and  the  homes  of 
their  daughters,  it  seems  certain  that  the  coun- 
try will  continue  to  expand  in  population  from 
decade  to  decade. 


XXI 

DESCENDANTS  OF  IMMIGRANTS 

ik  S  has  been  indicated  in  previous  chapters, 
AA  once  the  immigrant  gets  settled  in 
America  and  carves  out  a  home  for  him- 
self and  his  posterity,  marked  changes  come 
over  him,  and  in  many  respects  the  after- 
generations  become  unlike  their  progenitors. 
Not  only  is  this  true  in  such  ephemeral  and 
fleeting  qualities  as  customs,  language,  dress, 
and  the  like,  but  it  affects  the  more  permanent 
characteristics  such  as  stature,  shape  of  the 
head,  fecundity,  and  disposition.  In  dress  the 
transition  from  European  peasant  to  American 
citizen  sometimes  does  not  take  place  with  the 
immigrant,  but  certainly  does  not  wait  longer 
than  the  first  generation  before  taking  place. 
One  is  reminded  of  the  little  scrap  of  doggerel 
about  Mary,  the  immigrant's  daughter,  who 
"  had  a  little  hat  no  bigger  than  a  stopper,,, 
but  who  soon  "got  rid  of  that,  and  now  she 
wears  a  whopper." 

The  great  majority  of  the  children  of  immi- 
grants learn  to  speak  English  and  soon  use 
171 


172  THE  IMMIGRANT 

it  as  their  regular  tongue.  Very  few  of  the 
grandchildren  of  immigrants  adhere  to  the 
tongue  of  their  fathers  in  Europe.  But  there 
are  cases  where  the  mother  tongue  persists 
through  long  generations.  Terence  V.  Pow- 
derly,  the  efficient  chief  of  the  Division  of 
Information  of  the  Bureau  of  Immigration, 
tells  of  an  experience  he  had  in  Lancaster 
County,  Penn.,  which  illustrates  the  tendency 
of  some  people  to  hold  to  the  customs  of  the 
fatherland.  He  was  out  on  immigration  busi- 
ness and  went  to  a  livery  stable  to  hire  a 
horse  and  buggy.  The  owner  of  the  stable  was 
a  Pennsylvania  Dutchman.  All  of  the  horses 
were  out  except  the  family  driving  horse.  This 
nag  was  hitched  up  and  Powderly  started  on 
his  journey,  but  he  soon  found  that  the  horse 
could  not  understand  English,  and  so,  since  he 
could  not  speak  German,  he  had  to  adopt  horse 
language  Esperanto  and  lead  the  steed  back  to 
the  stable.  That  liveryman's  ancestors  had  been 
in  Pennsylvania  for  a  century  and  a  half,  and 
yet  his  driving  horse  did  not  understand 
"Whoa"  or  "  Giddap." 

While  it  has  been  demonstrated  that  there  is 
a  remarkable  amount  of  insanity  among 
immigrants,  and  while  insanity  is  usually 
regarded  as  an  inheritable  disease,  there  is 
nothing  to  indicate  that  the  percentage  of  in- 


DESCENDANTS  OF  IMMIGRANTS     173 

sane  among  the  descendants  of  immigrants  is 
any  greater  than  that  among  people  of  pure 
American  stock  with  American  ancestry  run- 
ning back  a  century.  How  much  more  fre- 
quently the  thread  of  reason  is  broken  in  the 
alien  mind  is  illustrated  by  the  investigations 
of  the  Census  Bureau  into  insanity  and  feeble- 
mindedness in  hospitals  and  institutions.  This 
investigation  shows  that  while  twenty  out  of 
every  hundred  people  ten  years  old  and  over  in 
the  United  States  were  of  foreign  birth,  thirty- 
four  out  of  every  every  hundred  inmates  of 
hospitals  and  institutions  for  the  insane  and 
feeble-minded  were  of  foreign  birth.  In  other  I 
words,  while  the  foreign-born  element  ten  years 
old  and  over,  constitutes  one-fifth  of  our  popu- 
lation, it  makes  up  one-third  of  our  insane  and  • 
feeble-minded  charges. 

That  this  tendency  toward  insanity  and, 
feeble-mindedness  is  not  communicated  to  the' 
descendants  of  immigrants  is  revealed  by  the  L* 

inquiry  of  the  Census  Bureau  into  the  parent- 
age of  the  native-born  inmates  of  these  insti- 
tutions. This  shows  that  273  out  of  each 
thousand  inmates  are  the  children  of  foreign- 
born  parents,  while  277  out  of  each  thousand 
in  the  population  of  the  country  are  the  children 
of  immigrants.  In  other  words,  the  figures 
show  that  the  children  of  immigrants  are  just 


174  THE  IMMIGRANT 

a  shade  less  inclined  to  insanity  and  feeble- 
mindedness than  the  children  of  native  Ameri- 
cans. 

There  has  been  much  speculation  as  to  the 
causes  of  insanity  among  immigrants.  The 
freedom  from  undue  inclination  toward  insan- 
ity displayed  by  their  children  would  seem  to 
show  that  it  is  more  a  matter  of  environment 
than  inherited  taint.  Those  who  controvert 
this  idea  declare  that  the  reason  the  children  of 
immigrants  show  as  great  freedom  from  insan- 
ity as  the  native  American  population  lies  in 
the  fact  that  they  are  still  too  young  to  make 
a  different  showing.  They  point  to  other  Cen- 
sus figures  which  indicate  that  when  native- 
born  and  immigrant-born  people  of  the  same 
ages  are  considered,  the  native  born  have  some 
advantage.  Yet  this  advantage  is  narrowed 
down  to  a  beggarly  three  per  cent,  whereas,  ii 
a  comparison  between  the  immigrant  and  the 
native,  it  amounts  to  fifteen  per  cent. 

Some  of  the  high  rate  of  insanity  among 
aliens  is  accounted  for  by  the  great  difficulty 
of  inspecting  immigrants  thoroughly  enough  to 
keep  out  every  person  of  diseased  mind. 
When,  on  rush  days,  only  two  minutes  can  be 
given  to  each  immigrant  at  Ellis  Island,  it  will 
be  seen  how  hard  it  would  be  for  doctors  to 
detect  every  person  showing  mental  unbalance. 


DESCENDANTS  OF  IMMIGRANTS     175 

This  accounts  for  a  large  number  coming  in 
who  already  have  had  attacks  of  insanity.  Ther 
most  highly  civilized  nations  show  a  larger 
number  of  insane  than  those  not  so  high  up 
in  the  scale  of  civilization.  For  instance,  while 
there  were  in  institutions  88  Bohemians  per 
100,000  of  Bohemian  population,  when  the 
Census  Bureau  made  its  investigations,  there 
were  307  Canadians  and  238  Norwegians. 

But  more  than  all  this,  according  to  some  of 
the  doctors  who  have  had  long  experience  in 
immigration  inspection  work,  is  the  great 
change  in  environment  which  the  immigrant 
undergoes.  Instead  of  his  peaceful  little  cot- 
tage home  back  in  some  quiet  village,  he  sud- 
denly finds  himself  in  a  very  maelstrom  of 
humanity,  commerce,  and  industry,  calculated 
to  shatter  even  the  nerves  of  those  who  live 
amid  pleasant  surroundings  and  in  happy 
homes.  Such  conditions  are  more  likely  to 
send  to  the  madhouse  the  lonely  foreigner  who 
ekes  out  a  living  in  some  sweatshop  by  day  and 
spends  his  nights  in  miserable  tenements  where 
comfort  and  peace  have  always  yielded  place 
to  filth  and  misery.  When  the  immigrant  un- 
der such  conditions  contrasts  his  little  cottage 
home  he  left  behind  with  his  new  surround- 
ings, what  wonder  homesickness  overcomes 
him  and  is  often  succeeded  by  a  wrecked  mind  ? 


176  THE  IMMIGRANT 

But,  fortunately,  his  children  escape  such  a 
heavy  toll. 

We  have  seen  how  the  bodily  form  of  the 
immigrant's  descendants  changes,  and  this  is 
one  of  the  most  remarkable  phases  of  the  whole 
immigration  question.  Anthropologists  have 
been  much  surprised  to  see  the  most  fixed  of 
all  the  racial  characteristics  change  under  the 
influence  of  American  conditions.  Of  course 
a  race  which  has  lived  for  generations  under 
tropical  suns  will  have  the  mark  thereof  burnt 
into  their  faces,  and  residence  in  colder  climates 
tends  to  obliterate  these  marks.  But  when 
the  very  bones  themselves  undergo  changes, 
changes  that  cannot  be  attributed  to  heavy 
work  or  other  like  conditions,  anthropologists 
become  puzzled  to  account  for  them. 

What  makes  the  skull  of  the  round-headed 
immigrant  turn  long- faced  in  his  children? 
And  what  makes  the  long  face  of  other  classes 
of  immigrants  tend  to  round-headedness  in 
their  posterity  ?  These  are  questions  to  which 
no  acceptable  answers  have  been  given.  Again, 
what  makes  the  descendants  of  immigrants 
mature  earlier  than  the  immigrants  themselves 
matured,  and  what  makes  the  descendants  of 
some  races  of  immigrants  grow  shorter  in 
stature  while  the  descendants  of  other  races  of 
immigrants  grow  taller?     For  instance,   the 


DESCENDANTS  OF  IMMIGRANTS     177 

Bohemians  lose  stature,  but  their  faces  grow 
longer  and  their  heads  wider.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Sicilians  gain  in  stature  and  in  the 
width  of  their  faces,  but  lose  in  the  width  of 
their  heads.  Why  does  America  have  one  ef- 
fect on  one  race  and  diametrically  the  oppo- 
site effect  upon  other  people  in  practically  the 
same  surroundings? 

Some  one  suggested  that  all  this  was  due 
to  the  fact  that  there  was  a  similar  change 
among  these  races  going  on  in  their  European 
homes.  But  when  this  matter  was  investi- 
gated it  was  found  that  the  Sicilian  who  came 
over  as  an  immigrant  thirty  years  ago  bore 
practically  the  same  measurements  as  the  one 
who  comes  to-day.  And  the  same  was  true  of 
the  Bohemian,  and  of  the  other  races  investi- 
gated. 

If,  then,  Americanization  is  an  influence 
powerful  and  far-reaching  enough  to  change 
the  most  permanent  of  all  the  characteristics 
of  a  race,  to  make  man  over  a  different  physical 
mould,  what  must  be  its  influence  on  his  tastes, 
his  ambitions,  his  manner  of  thinking?  What 
wonder  is  it  that  we  see  tens  of  thousands  of 
men  who  were  born  in  other  countries  gazing 
upon  the  flag  of  their  fatherlands  with  a  quiet 
indifference,  but  cheering  to  the  echo  when  the 
Star    Spangled    Banner    is    unfurled    to   the 


178  THE  IMMIGRANT 

breeze?  What  wonder  that  there  are  twenty 
million  children  of  immigrants  in  the  United 
States  in  whose  hearts  there  exists  a  patriotic 
fire  that  is  thoroughly  American  ?  What  won- 
der that  there  are  some  two-score  millions  more 
Americans,  grandchildren  of  immigrants,  who 
are  as  thoroughly  American  as  those  whose 
ancestry  goes  back  to  Jamestown  and  Plymouth 
Rock? 

That  most  of  them  remember  with  affection 
their  ancestral  home  is  no  more  to  be  charged 
against  their  devoted  Americanism  than  is  the 
pride  of  a  Massachusetts  man  who  traces  his 
line  back  to  Plymouth,  or  that  of  the  South 
Carolinian  whose  forefathers  were  French 
Huguenots.  They  all  are  Americans  and 
America  is  theirs. 


I 


<From   National   Geographic   Magazine,   Washington,   D.    C.     Copyright,    1913.) 
A  GREEK  PEASANT. 


XXII 
PADRONES  AND  PEONS 

WHEN  Italian  immigration  first  set  to 
American  shores  ignorance  of  the 
English  language  and  lack  of  knowl- 
edge of  labour  conditions  in  the  United  States 
compelled  labourers  from  Italy  to  depend  upon 
their  employers  almost  as  children  depend  upon 
their  fathers.  These  employers  usually  were 
small  contractors  who  had  acquired  a  working 
knowledge  of  English  and  a  fair  acquaintance 
with  American  labour  conditions,  through  sev- 
eral years  of  apprenticeship  as  labourers. 
They  would  hire  their  fellow-countrymen  to 
work  for  them,  usually  board  them,  and  be 
their  advisers  in  all  things.  This  peculiar  situa- 
tion led  the  new  immigrants  to  call  their  em- 
ployers, "  padrones,"  just  as  in  Italy  the  wife 
usually  called  her  lord  and  master  her  padrone. 
The  padrone  system  in  this  country  is  at 
present  confined  to  those  races  which  have  lit- 
tle aptitude  for  acquiring  a  working  knowledge 
of  English.  The  Italians,  with  whom  the 
padrone  system  began  in  the  United  States, 
179 


180  THE  IMMIGRANT 

have  outgrown  it  and  manage  their  own  affairs. 
There  is  an  exception  in  the  case  of  organ- 
grinders  and  a  few  women  and  children.  Con- 
tact with  Americans  always  ends  the  system. 

The  Syrian  peddlers  who  peddle  drygoods 
and  notions  in  the  city  and  country  were  for 
a  number  of  years  under  a  padrone  system. 
The  peddlers  were  furnished  their  outfits  by 
the  padrone,  who  also  boarded  them,  and  they 
were  given  either  a  salary  or  commissions  on 
their  sales.  But  peddling  became  unprofitable 
and  the  Syrians  who  continued  to  engage  in 
the  work  soon  learned  to  manage  their  own 
affairs,  until  now  the  padrone  system  as  ap- 
plied to  Syrians  is  seldom  encountered. 

At  present  it  flourishes  mainly  among  the 
Bulgarians,  Turks,  Macedonians,  Greeks,  and 
Mexicans.  Among  the  Bulgarians  and  Turks 
it  is  on  the  decline,  but  it  still  affects  labourers 
of  these  races  in  factories,  mills,  foundries,  and 
on  the  railroads.  Among  the  Macedonians,  the 
system  for  the  most  part  affects  the  peddlers 
of  fruits  and  candies.  Among  the  Greeks  the 
system  still  affects  some  railroad  labourers,  and 
prevails  to  some  extent  among  the  flower,  fruit, 
and  vegetable  venders  of  New  York  and  Chi- 
cago, but  it  principally  exists  among  the  shoe- 
shining  parlours,  where  boys  from  twelve  to 
seventeen  years  of  age  are  in  demand. 


PADRONES  AND  PEONS  181 

The  Greek  flower  venders  in  New  York  are 
usually  boys  under  sixteen  years  of  age,  hired 
by  florists  who  send  them  to  Park  Row  and 
other  points  to  sell  old  stock  that  cannot  be  sold 
in  the  stores.  The  boys  employed  by  the  florists 
usually  live  in  good  quarters,  are  given  their 
board,  and  paid  from  $50  to  $100  a  year  for 
their  work.  The  boys  who  sell  vegetables, 
fruits,  and  candies  usually  live  in  basements 
or  other  filthy  surroundings,  sometimes  over 
horse  stables.  Their  bedrooms  are  small, 
poorly  ventilated,  and  usually  filled  to  their 
capacity  with  beds.  These  have  no  sheets,  no 
pillow  cases,  and  at  times  no  pillows.  The 
only  coverings  are  cheap  blankets  from  Greece, 
which  become  foul-smelling  under  prolonged 
absence  from  the  washtub.  Sometimes  three 
and  four  boys  must  sleep  in  one  bed.  The 
supply  of  unsold  stock  is  kept  overnight  in 
these  quarters,  usually  under  the  beds.  Each 
peddling  company  has  from  three  to  four 
wagons  and  from  four  to  eight  boys.  Three 
or  four  nights  out  of  each  week  they  have  beef 
stews  and  beans  or  potatoes  for  their  one 
square  meal  for  the  day.  The  other  nights 
they  get  nothing  but  bread,  cheese,  and  black 
olives.  They  start  to  work  by  sunup  and  work 
until  sundown. 

In  the  shoe-shining  business,  the  boys  live  in 


182  THE  IMMIGRANT 

insanitary  quarters,  sleep  with  all  the  windows 
down,  and  either  have  to  share  their  beds  with 
two  or  three  other  boys,  or  roll  up  in  blankets 
on  the  floor.  In  large  establishments,  one  of 
the  boys  remains  at  home  in  the  morning  and 
prepares  the  midday  and  evening  meals.  The 
midday  meal  usually  consists  of  black  olives, 
bread,  and  cheese.  The  boy  who  stays  at  home 
brings  the  meal  down  to  the  shop,  the  padrone 
apportions  it,  and  one  boy  at  a  time  retires  be- 
hind the  partition  to  eat.  The  boys  get  up 
about  five  in  the  morning  and  seldom  reach 
home  until  after  ten  at  night. 

Frequently  the  padrones,  in  order  to  save 
rent  for  the  boys'  lodgings,  get  them  an  hour's 
walk  from  the  shop,  and  the  boys  must  walk 
the  distance  twice  a  day,  for  no  carfares  are 
allowed.  They  never  get  a  holiday,  for  the 
shop  is  open  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  days 
in  the  year.  Padrones  forbid  the  boys  to  have 
anything  to  say  to  Greeks  except  in  their  pres- 
ence, and  they  do  everything  they  can  to  keep 
them  in  ignorance  of  English.  They  usually 
insist  upon  reading  all  letters  the  boys  receive, 
and  force  them  to  lie  about  their  age  and  the 
conditions  of  their  work,  if  they  are  allowed  to 
answer  questions  at  all.  They  scrutinize  all 
letters  the  boys  send  home,  so  their  relatives 
will  not  know  of  the  straits  they  are  in.    The 


PADRONES  AND  PEONS  183 

only  chance  they  have  to  go  to  church  is  during 
Holy  Week  and  on  Easter  Morning,  when 
they  are  permitted  to  go  between  ten  o'clock  at 
night  and  four  in  the  morning. 

The  ravages  which  such  a  life  imposes  upon 
the  constitutions  of  boys  are  appalling.  The 
prevalence  of  tuberculosis  is  extensive,  super- 
induced by  their  manner  of  life,  their  inhala- 
tion of  millions  of  microbes  in  the  dust  of 
customers'  shoes,  and  of  the  injurious  odours 
of  the  polishing  chemicals.  The  Greek  Consul 
General  at  Chicago  says  the  majority  of  the 
boys  contract  tuberculosis,  and  that  in  his 
opinion,  and  that  of  a  large  number  of  Greek 
doctors,  it  would  be  more  humane  for  them 
to  be  refused  admission  into  the  United  States 
than  to  allow  them  to  come  here  if  they  intend 
to  enter  such  employment. 

The  rise  of  the  shoe-shining  parlour  and  the 
Greek  padrone  system  began  about  fifteen  years 
ago.  One  of  the  pioneer  padrones  is  credited 
with  having  opened  more  than  a  hundred  par- 
lours. Most  of  the  boys  at  first  came  from 
Arcadia.  As  the  business  grew  all  Greece  was 
called  on  for  boys,  and  some  of  the  early  boot- 
blacks themselves  became  padrones,  as  rigor- 
ous in  their  treatment  of  the  boys  as  their  own 
masters  had  been. 

In  1903  a  number  of  other  padrones  decided 


184  THE  IMMIGRANT 

to  form  a  shoe-shining  trust,  but  the  Bureau  of 
Immigration  objected  so  strongly,  because  of 
their  violations  of  the  contract  labour  laws, 
that  they  apparently  gave  up  the  project.  All 
sorts  of  methods  of  evading  the  immigration 
laws  are  used,  and  it  is  conceded  to  be  almost 
impossible  to  stop  the  incoming  tide  of  boys 
destined  to  these  shops. 

The  wages  paid  by  the  padrones  range  from 
$80  to  $250  a  year.  If  you  frequent  a  Greek 
shoe-shining  parlour  and  want  to  tip  the  boy 
you  might  as  well  abandon  the  idea,  for  you 
are  only  helping  the  padrone  to  pay  the  boy's 
salary.  The  average  wage  of  the  boys  is  from 
$120  to  $180  a  year,  and  his  tips  usually 
amount  to  the  latter  sum.  But,  as  soon  as  you 
leave,  that  tip  goes  into  the  padrone's  little  tip- 
box,  and  the  poor  boy  sees  it  no  more.  It  has 
been  shown  by  the  investigations  of  the  Bureau 
of  Immigration  that  the  tips  the  padrone  takes 
away  from  his  boys  more  than  suffice  to  pay 
their  salaries  and  their  board  bill,  so  that  their 
work  costs  him  nothing. 

When  the  Immigration  Commission  took  up 
its  work  it  decided  to  look  into  peonage  condi- 
tions in  the  United  States,  as  well  as  to  get 
information  concerning  peonage.  Indeed,  un- 
der sensational  representations  in  many  periodi- 
cals, Congress  itself  instituted  an  investigation 


PADRONES  AND  PEONS  185 

of  the  charges  of  peonage.  The  Commission 
appointed  a  committee  of  its  members  to  take 
up  the  matter.  The  most  interesting  discovery 
made  was  the  fact  that  there  is  no  law  upon 
the  statute  books  prohibiting  simple  slavery. 
While  the  Thirteenth  Amendment  prohibits 
slavery,  the  Commission  says  that  "  if  a  per- 
son simply  places  or  holds  another  in  slavery, 
it  is  impossible  for  the  Federal  Courts  to  im- 
pose penalties  under  United  States  laws,  unless 
the  placing  or  holding  be  for  the  purpose  of 
forcing  a  settlement  of  a  debt,  no  matter  how 
great  may  be  the  abuses  perpetrated  upon  the 
person  held.  In  the  Clyatt  case  the  Supreme 
Court  unmistakably  held  that  the  peonage  stat- 
ute referred  only  to  cases  where  the  return, 
arrest,  or  holding  has  been  for  the  purpose  of 
enforcing  a  debt." 

The  main  charge  of  the  existence  of  peonage 
was  in  connection  with  the  building  of  the 
Florida  East  Coast  Railway  extension  over  the 
Florida  keys  to  Key  West.  This  was  investi- 
gated and  the  Commission  found  no  real  evi- 
dence of  peonage.  Later  it  investigated  con- 
ditions in  Maine  and  declared  that  since  the 
evils  of  involuntary  servitude  have  been  largely 
stamped  out  in  the  South,  there  has  probably 
existed  in  Maine  the  most  complete  system  of 
peonage  in  the  entire  country.    In  late  years  the 


186  THE  IMMIGRANT 

natives  who  formerly  supplied  the  labour  for 
the  logging  concerns  have  been  engaged  in  the 
paper  mills,  and  the  lumber  concerns  have  been 
compelled  to  import  labour,  largely  foreigners, 
from  other  states.  Boston  is  the  chief  labour 
market,  and  the  employment  agents  frequently 
tell  the  labourers  that  the  camps  will  be  but 
a  few  miles  from  good  towns,  where  they 
can  come  frequently  for  recreation  and  enjoy- 
ment. Arriving  at  the  outskirts  of  civilization, 
the  men  are  hauled  for  some  distance  into  the 
forest  and  then  compelled  to  march  some  sixty 
or  seventy  miles  into  the  woods.  The  state 
legislature,  at  the  request  of  the  lumber  con- 
cerns, passed  a  law  requiring  labourers  to  work 
out  all  advances  made  to  them  on  account  of 
travelling  expenses,  outfitting,  and  the  like,  and 
the  lumbermen  use  this  as  a  club  with  which 
to  compel  the  labourers  to  stay  their  time  out. 


(Copyright  by  Underwood  and  Underwood,   N.   Y 
[IGRANTS    CHANGING    FOREIGN    MONEY     INTO     AMERICAN     CURR« 


XXIII 
THE  IMMIGRANT  BANK 

THE  immigrant  bank  is  an  institution 
which  flourishes  in  every  part  of  the 
United  States  where  immigrants  from 
southern  and  eastern  Europe  are  found  in  con- 
siderable numbers.  It  is  a  bank  that  bears  no 
closer  resemblance  to  ordinary  banking  institu- 
tions than  a  sailboat  bears  to  the  big  ocean 
greyhound  that  brings  the  immigrants  over. 
It  is  without  capital,  except  the  confidence  of 
the  immigrant  in  his  banker;  without  legal  re- 
sponsibility, except  what  little  the  common  law 
might  place  upon  it;  without  regulation,  except 
what  the  exigencies  of  business  require;  and 
wholly  without  legal  control  by  duly  constituted 
state  or  national  authorities. 

Immigrant  bankers  are,  as  a  rule,  also  steam- 
ship ticket  agents,  and  usually  conduct  other 
businesses  of  some  kind.  Frequently  they 
run  the  neighbourhood  grocery  store,  and  there 
is  little  chance  of  bad  debts  when  they  carry 
both  the  accounts  payable  and  the  accounts  re- 
ceivable of  their  customers.  Often  they  are 
187 


188  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  neighbourhood  saloon-keepers,  and  the 
banker  who  runs  a  saloon  and  an  immigrant 
bank  combined  is  always  prosperous. 

But  the  proprietor  of  the  immigrant  bank, 
though  he  may  also  be  a  saloon-keeper  or  a 
grocer,  is  not  entirely  mercenary.  He  not  only 
is  always  ready  to  handle  the  immigrants'  sav- 
ings, but  obliges  them  by  writing  their  letters, 
receiving  their  mail,  giving  them  advice,  and 
doing  everything  a  good  neighbour  might  be 
expected  to  do.  His  ability  and  willingness  to 
help  them  in  all  their  small — but  to  them  im- 
portant— affairs,  naturally  gives  him  the  ad- 
vantage over  regular  banking  institutions,  and 
makes  him  an  important  factor  in  the  life  of 
the  new  immigrant. 

The  immigrant's  deposits  are  not  subject  to 
check,  they  draw  no  interest,  and  there  is  no 
requirement  that  the  banker  shall  keep  a  re- 
serve fund  on  hand  to  take  care  of  any  pos- 
sible "  run  on  the  bank."  The  banker  simply 
plays  the  role  of  custodian  of  the  funds,  and 
uses  them  in  his  own  business  without  let  or 
hindrance.  The  transmission  of  the  money  of 
immigrants  to  their  friends  and  relatives 
abroad  is  an  important  part  of  the  business  of 
every  immigrant  banker.  It  is  estimated  that 
this  business  amounts  to  more  than  a  quarter 
of  a  billion  dollars  a  year.     The  immigrant 


THE  IMMIGRANT  BANK  189 

banker  usually  has  the  money  orders  of  some 
big  banking  house  whose  credit  is  good  on 
the  other  side,  and  these  orders  are  sold  to  the 
immigrants  who  wish  to  send  money  home,  the 
immigrant  banker  and  the  big  banking  house 
dividing  the  profit  of  the  exchange. 

The  best  information  available  shows  that 
there  are  nearly  three  thousand  of  these  banks 
in  operation  in  the  United  States,  and  that 
New  York  City  alone  has  about  a  thousand  of 
them.  They  never  have  flourished  among  im- 
migrants from  northwestern  Europe,  for  the 
reason  that  the  immigrants  from  those  coun- 
tries have  readily  fallen  in  with  the  regular 
American  banking  system.  To  the  immigrant 
from  eastern  and  southern  Europe  the  steam- 
ship company  that  brought  him  over,  and  its 
agents,  are  the  only  connecting  links  between 
him  and  the  fatherland.  He  looks  forward  to 
the  day  when  he  can  bring  his  family  from 
Europe  or  return  there  himself. 

Nothing  is  more  natural,  under  these  condi- 
tions, than  that  he  should  deposit  his  savings 
with  the  steamship  agent  in  preparation  for 
that  day.  It  is  not  long  before  the  steamship 
agent  has  the  nucleus  of  a  banking  business, 
and  his  assumption  of  the  role  of  banker 
quickly  follows.  And  then,  this  confidence  as- 
sures him  that  if  he  opens  up  still  another 


190  THE  IMMIGRANT 

business  he  will  get  the  immigrants5  trade.  So 
he  becomes  a  saloon-keeper,  a  grocer,  or  some- 
thing like  that.  It  also  happens,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  the  saloon-keeper  or  the  grocer  is 
led  into  the  banking  business  by  the  demands  of 
his  patrons.  Here  is  a  customer  who  brings 
his  savings  to  his  grocer  to  keep  over  Sunday 
because  he  has  a  safe  in  which  to  lock  them  up. 
Another  follows  suit,  and  still  others,  until 
the  grocer  is  a  banker  before  he  knows  it. 

The  immigrant  banker  deals  almost  wholly 
with  a  floating  population  of  alien  labourers. 
Having  just  arrived,  almost  wholly  beyond  the 
influence  of  Americanization,  completely  ig- 
norant of  American  banking  methods,  easily 
influenced  by  racial  appeal  and  largely  de- 
pendent upon  leaders  of  their  own  nationality, 
they  flock  to  the  immigrant  banker.  A  suc- 
cessful Italian  banker,  in  commenting  upon  the 
ignorance  and  trustfulness  of  his  patrons, 
pointed  out  the  ease  with  which  he  could  ex- 
ploit them  should  he  so  desire.  Often  they 
lose  their  deposit  receipts  and  forget  how  much 
is  due  them.  They  accept  without  question  his 
statement  of  the  amount.  A  member  of  a 
leading  steamship  agency  which  acts  as  a  de- 
positing agency,  in  trying  to  encourage  immi- 
grants to  patronize  regular  American  banks, 
declares  that,  without  solicitation,  his  agency 


THE  IMMIGRANT  BANK         191 

could  command  $200,000  in  immigrant  de- 
posits, so  frequent  and  insistent  are  the  requests 
from  the  immigrants  that  it  act  as  custodian 
of  their  funds. 

The  ordinary  American  bank  is  looked  upon 
with  suspicion  by  the  new  immigrant,  and, 
furthermore,  it  has  no  facilities  for  rendering 
the  sort  of  banking  service  the  immigrant 
needs.  When  they  see  the  magnificence  of  the 
rooms  of  some  of  our  big  banks  they  stand 
aghast,  and  are  sure  that  no  bank  can  be  hon- 
est which  has  (what  seems  to  them)  such 
extravagant  appointments.  The  equipment  of 
American  banks  prevents  them  from  entering 
into  a  fair  competition  with  the  immigrant 
banker.  A  Slovak  immigrant  banker,  in  apolo- 
gizing to  an  American  for  the  appearance  of 
his  banking  room,  declared  that  it  was  neces- 
sarily ill-kept,  because  the  men  came  to  the 
bank  in  their  working  clothes,  often  intoxi- 
cated, and  usually  smoking,  chewing,  and  spit- 
ting without  regard  to  cuspidors. 

While  there  are  many  large  and  carefully 
conducted  immigrant  banks  in  the  United 
States,  there  are  many  more  small  ones  which 
are  indifferently  conducted.  Some  of  the  large 
ones  fail  at  times.  A  Croatian  banker  in  New 
York,  who  had  branches  and  agencies  through- 
out the  country,  failed  to  the  extent  of  $600,- 


192  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ooo  in  1908.  In  some  of  the  banks  no  receipts 
are  given  and  no  pass-books  issued.  The  alien 
press  frequently  helps  keep  alive  a  prejudice 
against  American  institutions,  often  because 
those  who  control  the  papers  are  immigrant 
bankers.  A  certain  Slovak  banker  is  the  re- 
ligious leader  of  his  people,  and  the  organizer 
of  a  national  Slovak  society.  Although  he  has 
become  an  American  citizen,  in  the  several 
publications  he  issues,  ranging  from  a  daily 
paper  to  a  yearly  almanac,  he  preaches  Pan- 
Slovakism.  He  transmits  more  than  two  mil- 
lion dollars  to  Europe  and  sells  some  six  thou- 
sand steamship  tickets  every  year. 

Sometimes  immigrant  bankers  obtain  a  pos- 
tal sub-station  in  their  places  of  business,  and 
use  this  as  a  means  to  encourage  their  people 
to  patronize  them.  One  Italian  banker  who 
operated  such  a  station  in  connection  with  his 
bank,  made  it  appear  that  he  was  doing  a 
government  business.  He  failed,  with  liabil- 
ities of  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars. 

The  investigation  of  the  Immigration  Com- 
mission shows  that  comparatively  few  of  the 
immigrant  bankers  keep  an  adequate  reserve 
fund  on  hand,  and  also  that  there  are  many 
scoundrels  who  set  up  immigrant  banks  just 
long  enough  to  get  a  good  line  of  deposits,  and 
then   abscond,   leaving  the   poor   immigrants 


THE  IMMIGRANT  BANK         193 

without  a  cent  of  their  savings.  There  are 
frequent  instances  where  the  bankers,  in  per- 
fect good  faith,  make  use  of  the  funds  de- 
posited with  them,  and  fail  from  making  in- 
judicious investments. 

The  amount  deposited  by  the  immigrant  in 
an  immigrant  bank  seldom  exceeds  one  hun- 
dred dollars,  and  the  amount  sent  back  to 
Europe  at  a  time  averages  about  $35.  The 
bulk  of  the  savings  goes  back  through  the  im- 
migrant banks  rather  than  through  the  postal 
money  order  system,  because  the  immigrant 
does  not  know  how  to  make  out  the  application 
blank  and  the  postal  clerk  cannot  undertake 
to  do  it  for  him.  Yet,  in  spite  of  this  draw- 
back, the  postal  service  transmits  about  $75,- 
000,000  a  year  in  post-office  money  orders. 

Many  immigrant  bankers  undertake  to  trans- 
mit money  after  they  find  themselves  on  the 
verge  of  failure.  They  receive  the  money,  but 
do  not  transmit  it,  although  pretending  to.  It 
may  take  a  month  or  more  to  discover  that 
something  is  wrong,  and  meanwhile  the  banker 
absconds  and  leaves  nothing  behind.  Some  of 
them  have  paid  editorials  in  the  alien  news- 
papers telling  of  their  great  success  as  bankers, 
and  recommending  themselves  as  the  best 
mediums  for  the  transmission  of  money  to 
Europe.    The  superintendent  of  banks  for  the 


194*  THE  IMMIGRANT 

state  of  New  York  estimates  that  there  is 
probably  two  million  dollars  a  year  lost  to 
immigrants  through  the  operations  of  immi- 
grant bankers. 

Based  upon  its  investigations  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission  declares  that  some  method  of 
regulating  these  banks  and  of  protecting  the 
depositors  seems  imperative.  The  failure  or 
absconding  of  an  immigrant  banker  brings  dis- 
aster to  the  one  who  can  least  afford  it,  and 
sweeps  away  the  savings  of  one  who  has  lived 
like  a  dog  and  endured  the  greatest  hardships 
that  American  industry  requires  of  human 
flesh.  As  to  the  nature  of  the  security  to  be 
exacted  of  the  immigrant  banker  the  Commis- 
sion makes  no  recommendation.  The  remedy 
probably  will  have  to  come  through  state  laws 
rather  than  by  congressional  enactment. 


XXIV 
IMMIGRANT  CHARITY  SEEKERS 

IT  has  been  recognized  that  there  are  thou- 
sands of  immigrants  who  come  to  America 
and  get  lost  in  the  busy  life  of  this  bustling 
country.  While  the  immigration  laws  en- 
deavour to  exclude  those  who  are  likely  to 
become  public  charges,  there  are  no  fixed  rules 
by  which  such  things  can  be  determined.  In 
spite  of  the  most  rigid  enforcement  of  the  law, 
consistent  with  the  interests  of  the  immigrant 
and  the  country  to  which  he  comes,  there 
are  always  prospective  charity  seekers  who 
thread  their  way  through  the  immigrant  sta- 
tion. 

How  many  such  there  are  was  never  accu- 
rately ascertained  until  the  Immigration  Com- 
mission began  investigating  the  matter.  Not 
only  did  it  gather  what  data  it  could  in  the  few 
years  allotted,  but  it  also  digested  the  statistics 
of  the  Census  Bureau  on  pauperism  in  America, 
and  those,  also,  of  the  Bureau  of  Immigration, 
the  figures  of  the  two  bureaus  extending  from 
1850  to  1908.  Its  own  plans  of  investigation 
195 


196  THE  IMMIGRANT 

were  made  after  conferences  with  the  officials 
of  the  field  department  for  the  extension  of 
organized  charity  in  the  United  States.  In 
addition  to  receiving  general  information  con- 
cerning charitable  assistance  rendered  to  immi- 
grants in  certain  typical  industrial  centres,  it 
secured  data  relative  to  aid  furnished  immi- 
grants during  certain  periods  by  charity  organi- 
zations in  a  number  of  typical  cities. 

Information  was  secured  concerning  more 
than  thirty  thousand  cases  of  people  who  had 
received  charitable  assistance,  and  it  was  found 
that  nearly  two-fifths  of  these  cases  were  those 
of  immigrants,  while  only  one-tenth  of  them 
were  cases  of  children  of  immigrants.  In  Mil- 
waukee, Buffalo,  and  Cleveland  two-thirds  of 
the  cases  were  immigrants ;  and  the  percentage 
in  Boston,  Chicago,  and  San  Francisco  was 
more  than  three-fifths.  In  a  number  of  cities 
more  than  half  of  the  cases  were  immigrants. 
The  inquiry  revealed  the  fact  that  there  were 
nearly  four  people  dependent  upon  the  average 
immigrant  who  received  assistance.  It  fur- 
thermore showed  that  the  immigrants,  as  a 
whole,  tried  to  get  along,  and  that  only  in  one- 
fifth  of  these  cases  presented  was  the  fault  that 
of  the  breadwinner.  In  three-fifths  of  the  cases 
aid  was  necessary  because  the  breadwinner 
lacked  employment  or  had  insufficient  wages  to 


IMMIGRANT  CHARITY  SEEKERS    197 

support  those  dependent  upon  his  labour.  The 
hardships  of  the  family  were  less  frequently 
due  to  the  neglect  or  bad  habits  of  the  bread- 
winner in  cases  of  immigrants,  than  in  the 
cases  of  native  Americans,  and,  in  the  case 
of  the  immigrant,  they  affected  fewer  de- 
pendents. 

A  silent  commentary  upon  the  greater  dan- 
gers to  which  the  immigrant  is  exposed,  when 
compared  with  the  native  born,  is  seen  in  the 
nature  of  cases  which  require  charity.  Of  the 
American  charity  seekers  aided,  27.7  per  cent 
were  aided  because  of  the  death  or  disability  of 
the  breadwinner;  in  the  case  of  immigrants, 
30.2  per  cent. 

Some  races  are  much  more  given  to  seeking 
charity  because  of  the  neglect  or  bad  habits 
of  their  breadwinners  than  others.  More  than 
one-fourth  of  the  charity  cases  among  the 
Finns,  the  Lithuanians,  and  the  Norwegians 
was  due  to  the  neglect  or  bad  habits  of  the  head 
of  the  family,  while  in  the  case  of  the  Dutch, 
the  Hebrews,  the  Italians,  and  the  Syrians 
less  than  one-eighth  of  the  charity  seeking  was 
due  to  these  causes.  The  Syrians  experienced 
more  difficulty  in  getting  along  because  of  lack 
of  employment  or  insufficient  earnings  than 
any  other  race,  and  they  did  not  seek  charity 
for  many  other  reasons.    Three  out  of  every 


198  THE  IMMIGRANT 

four  cases  of  relief  sought  among  them  was 
the  result  of  no  work  or  low  earnings.  On  the 
other  hand,  less  than  half  of  the  Swedes  were 
helped  upon  these  grounds. 

As  in  nearly  all  of  the  other  statistical  in- 
quiries by  which  immigrants,  their  children, 
and  native  Americans  may  be  compared,  this 
one  shows  that  the  children  of  immigrants  ap- 
proximate the  native  standards,  as  a  rule,  and 
fall  between  the  immigrant  and  the  American 
of  native  parentage.  The  children  of  immi- 
grants received  aid  less  frequently  because  of 
old  age  than  the  children  of  native  parents,  and 
likewise  needed  aid  fewer  times  because  of 
deaths  or  disabilities  in  the  families.  On  the 
other  hand,  among  the  children  of  immigrants 
there  was  a  larger  number  of  breadwinners 
whose  dependents  sought  charity  because  of 
neglect  or  bad  habits  than  either  among  the 
immigrants  themselves  or  among  native  Amer- 
icans. Likewise,  they  were  more  frequently 
out  of  work  or  had  insufficient  earnings  than 
either  of  the  other  classes. 

When  the  immigrant  sought  charity  his 
needs  were  greater,  because  he  had  a  larger 
family  than  the  native.  There  were  twice  as 
many  families  of  ten  or  more  among  the  im- 
migrants aided,  more  than  twice  as  many 
families  of  nine  and  nearly  twice  as  many  fami- 


IMMIGRANT  CHARITY  SEEKERS    199 

lies  of  six,  seven,  and  eight,  respectively.  It 
will  be  seen  from  this  that  one  reason  why  the 
immigrant  seeks  charity  so  frequently  is  the 
fact  that  he  has  such  a  large  family  that  any 
untoward  incident  in  the  family  economy  leaves 
him  unable  to  meet  the  demands  upon  him. 

The  charity  cases  examined  show  that  the 
immigrant  respects  the  marriage  bond  more 
than  the  native  American.  While  approxi- 
mately eleven  out  of  every  hundred  cases 
among  native  Americans  were  those  of  women 
who  had  been  deserted  or  who  were  separated 
from  their  husbands,  among  the  immigrants  as- 
sistance for  that  cause  was  required  in  less 
than  eight  out  of  every  hundred  cases.  And 
almost  without  exception  the  races  from  south- 
ern and  eastern  Europe  showed  the  lowest  per- 
centage of  desertion  and  neglect. 

The  immigrant,  as  a  rule,  hesitates  to  seek 
charity  until  he  has  been  in  America  for  four 
years.  Seven-eighths  of  all  the  cases  presented 
in  the  Immigration  Commission's  report  were 
those  of  immigrants  who  had  been  in  America 
for  more  than  four  years.  Of  course,  if  they 
become  a  public  charge  at  an  early  date  after 
landing  they  are  liable  to  deportation,  and  this 
may  lead  them  to  keep  their  misery  to  them- 
selves. 

One  is  surprised  at  the  number  of  those 


200  THE  IMMIGRANT 

seeking  charity  who  are  able  to  speak  English. 
The  natural  inference  would  be  that  those  who 
cannot  speak  the  American  tongue  would  have 
the  hardest  time  to  get  adequate  work,  and 
that  this  would  bring  a  larger  percentage  of 
them  to  the  charity  relief  organizations.  But 
only  about  three  per  cent  of  the  children  of 
immigrants  who  seek  charity  are  unable  to 
speak  English,  and  less  than  one- fourth  of  the 
immigrant  charity  seekers  themselves  are  un- 
able to  do  so. 

The  care  taken  to  admit  only  able-bodied 
immigrants  and  dependents  who  have  relatives 
both  able  and  willing  to  support  them,  has 
tended  to  reduce  to  a  minimum  the  need  for 
charity,  and  pauperism  is  the  exception  and  not 
the  rule.  But  it  was  not  always  so.  In  the 
earlier  days,  when  immigration  was  unregu- 
lated, immigrant  pauperism  was  one  of  the 
most  serious  evils  of  immigration,  and  this  was 
enhanced  by  the  fact  that  many  European  com- 
munities preferred  to  pay  the  cost  of  trans- 
porting their  paupers  to  America  rather  than 
provide  for  them  in  almshouses.  It  is  recorded 
that  in  many  instances  a  large  proportion  of 
an  entire  shipload  of  immigrants  would  be 
so  destitute  that  it  was  necessary  to  transport 
them  directly  to  poorhouses,  where  they  were 
cared  for  until  they  could  get  work.     The 


IMMIGRANT  CHARITY  SEEKERS    201 

records  of  the  poorhouses  of  that  day  show  that 
they  were  a  refuge  for  thousands  of  immi- 
grants who  had  just  arrived  in  America  with 
no  other  asset  than  the  scant  clothes  upon  their 
backs. 

One  of  the  things  which  helps  to  keep  down 
the  number  of  charity-seeking  immigrants  is 
the  fact  that  those  who  come  over  and  fail  in 
their  battle  for  living  may  be  returned  within 
three  years  at  the  expense  of  the  government. 
Often  it  happens  that  when  an  immigrant  finds 
America  too  hard  for  him,  he  suddenly  de- 
velops symptoms  of  incurable  disease,  and 
finds  himself  unable  to  work.  He  keeps  up  the 
deception  until  he  reaches  the  immigration 
authorities,  and  if  he  can  convince  them,  he  is 
sent  back  to  his  native  land  without  expense 
to  himself. 

On  the  whole,  the  immigrant  must  be  com- 
mended for  his  pluck  in  fighting  the  battle  of 
life.  He  frequently  has  to  start  out  in  lines 
of  work  which  afford  the  smallest  compensation 
and,  when  he  is  married,  he  usually  has  more 
than  his  share  of  mouths  to  feed.  Large  fami- 
lies and  low  wages  mean  a  very  stern  fight  with 
poverty.  And,  furthermore,  his  burden  is  made 
heavier  by  the  lack  of  helpful  encouragement 
from  the  native  Americans  around  him.  His 
problem  of  earnings  meet  expenses  is  an  ever- 


202  THE  IMMIGRANT 

present  one.  He  has  little  chance  to  lay  by 
anything  for  a  rainy  day  and  when  the  rainy 
day  comes  he  simply  does  without  the  neces- 
sities he  cannot  buy.  He  makes  a  noble,  if 
unheralded,  fight  against  adversity,  and  the 
wonder  is  that  he  is  not  forced  to  seek  charity 
more  often  than  he  does. 

On  the  whole,  it  cannot  be  said  that  the  im- 
migrant peoples  have  added  to  the  burdens  of 
those  who  provide  for  the  unfortunate.  Much 
of  the  actual  misery  among  them  is  relieved 
by  the  people  of  their  own  race  and,  it  must 
be  said,  that  much  charity  has  been  dispensed 
to  native  Americans  by  the  generosity  of  those 
who  themselves  came  here  through  Ellis  Island. 


XXV 

IMMIGRANTS  FROM  ASIA 

SO  far  as  the  coming  of  immigrants  from 
China,  Japan,  and  Korea  is  concerned, 
conditions  are  now  regarded  as  satisfac- 
tory. The  Chinese  Exclusion  Law  operates  so 
well,  and  the  agreement  with  Japan  is  carried 
out  with  such  good  faith  by  the  Japanese  gov- 
ernment, that  there  are  no  changes  recom- 
mended by  the  Immigration  Commission.  But 
there  is  another  tide  of  Asiatic  immigration 
that  is  giving  much  concern  to < the  Pacific 
Coast.  This  is  the  stream  of  humanity  coming 
from  India.  These  East  Indian  coolies  are 
Aryans,  and  belong  to  that  immigrant  tide 
which  swept  out  of  the  cradle  of  the  race  far 
up  in  northwestern  Asia,  and  down  through 
the  lands  of  the  Medes  and  Persians  into  India. 
But,  according  to  the  findings  of  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission,  they  are,  from  no  point  of 
view,  desirable  members  of  the  community. 
The  British  government,  whose  subjects  they 
are,  acceded  a  few  years  ago  to  Canada's 
203 


204  THE  IMMIGRANT 

desire  to  exclude  them.  That  turned  the  tide 
to  the  Pacific  Coast  of  our  own  country.  The 
Commission  recommends  that  steps  be  taken  to 
induce  the  British  government  to  stop  their 
coming  to  the  United  States  by  the  same  policy 
that  Japan  prevents  Japanese  labour  from  com- 
ing. 

The  East  Indians  are  entering  the  United 
States  at  the  rate  of  about  a  thousand  a  year. 
Of  these  nearly  seven-eighths  are  Hindus  wear- 
ing the  turban.  The  first  important  immigra- 
tion of  East  Indian  labourers  into  the  United 
States  came  from  British  Columbia,  where,  as 
a  result  of  the  activity  of  steamship  agents  and 
the  spread  of  Canadian  literature  in  India,  there 
arrived  over  five  thousand  of  them  in  four 
years.  As  soon  as  Canada  decided  that  these 
immigrants  were  undesirable,  they  were  denied 
admission  unless  coming  direct  from  their  na- 
tive land  upon  through  tickets.  The  amount  of 
money  required  to  be  shown  was  also  advanced 
from  $25  to  $200.  Since  there  are  no  steam- 
ship lines  direct  to  Canada  from  India,  the 
intent  of  Canada  to  exclude  the  East  Indian 
is  plain. 

The  Hindu  labourers  who  had  already  come 
to  Canada  soon  found  that  the  winters  of  that 
country  were  too  rigorous  for  them,  and  fur- 
thermore, that  the  lumber  mills  and  salmon  in- 


IMMIGRANTS  FROM  ASIA        205 

dustry  in  Washington  and  Oregon  offered  bet- 
ter wages  than  they  were  getting  in  British 
Columbia.  Of  course,  when  a  labourer  could 
get  $1.60  a  day  for  his  work  on  this  side  of 
the  line,  and  only  80  cents  to  $1.25  a  day  on 
the  other  side,  he  was  not  long  in  crossing  the 
line. 

But  when  Canada  barred  her  boundaries 
against  them,  immigration  from  British  Co- 
lumbia soon  exhausted  the  supply,  and  those 
who  come  now  are  directly  from  India.  Con- 
sidered by  the  government  as  the  most  unde- 
sirable class  of  immigrants  who  ever  came  to 
American  shores,  a  policy  of  most  rigid  inspec- 
tion has  been  adopted  at  Pacific  Coast  ports, 
and  if  there  is  any  possible  reason  for  exclud- 
ing a  Hindu,  he  is  promptly  turned  back  upon 
the  steamship  company  for  transportation  back 
to  India.  Nearly  one-half  of  all  those  who 
come  are  rejected.  Yet,  in  spite  of  the  strict- 
est interpretation  of  the  law,  they  still  continue 
to  come,  and  it  is  the  opinion  of  the  Immigra- 
tion Commission  that  unless  some  radical  meas- 
ures of  exclusion  are  adopted,  they  may  insist 
upon  coming  into  this  country  in  large  num- 
bers. 

Nearly  all  of  the  Hindu  immigrants  have 
been  agricultural  labourers  in  India.  A  large 
majority  of  them  come  here  ambitious  to  save 


206  THE  IMMIGRANT 

$2,000  and  then  return  home.  However,  many 
of  them  come  to  stay  permanently,  predicating 
their  determination  upon  British  oppression  at 
home.  Most  of  them  are  not  physically  sturdy 
enough  to  meet  with  favour  as  construction 
labourers  or  section  hands  on  the  railroads,  so 
the  only  thing  left  to  them  is  to  become  farm 
labourers.  Here  their  work  is  limited  almost 
wholly  to  hoeing  and  weeding.  In  most  of  the 
communities,  because  of  their  dirty  appearance 
and  their  turbans,  they  find  it  difficult  to  get 
work.  They  usually  go  from  place  to  place  in 
small  gangs,  with  one  of  their  number  as  leader, 
business  manager,  and  interpreter.  Many  of 
them  find  great  difficulty  to  secure  work  during 
the  winter  months.  The  Commission  calls 
their  competitive  position  the  most  insecure  of 
any  race,  and  says  that  when  other  labour  is 
available  the  Hindus  find  little  favour  with 
employers. 

The  standard  of  living  among  the  Hindus 
in  California  is  lower  than  that  of  any  of  the 
races  with  whom  they  compete.  Having  no 
families,  they  usually  have  no  furniture  and 
sleep  upon  blankets  on  the  floor  or  ground. 
They  generally  cook  upon  a  grate  placed  over 
a  fire  built  in  a  hole  in  the  ground.  If  there 
happen  to  be  members  of  different  castes  in 
the  gang,  those  of  each  caste  mess  separately, 


IMMIGRANTS  FROM  ASIA        207 

and  all  food  eaten  must  be  prepared  by  a  mem- 
ber of  the  caste  eating  it.  They  will  not  eat 
any  meat  that  they  do  not  kill  and  dress  them- 
selves, so  they  get  but  little  of  it.  The  strength 
of  their  caste  feeling  is  revealed  by  the  fact  that 
when  placed  in  jail  for  petit  larceny  or  other 
misdemeanours,  they  consistently  refuse  food 
not  brought  and  prepared  by  members  of  their 
own  caste.  One  of  them  fasted  for  ten  days 
rather  than  eat  food  not  prepared  by  his  caste. 
The  jail  authorities  kept  him  from  starving  to 
death  only  by  providing  him  a  stove  upon 
which  he  could  prepare  his  own  food. 

The  average  Hindu  spends  about  twenty-five 
cents  a  day  for  his  food  and  thirty  dollars  a 
year  for  his  clothes,  of  which  he  seldom  has  a 
change.  Dressing  up,  with  him,  consists  in 
changing  his  turban  and  putting  on  his  coat. 
He  saves  money  but  sends  it  back  to  India  as 
fast  as  he  saves  it,  so  that  he  seldom  has  any 
on  hand  for  periods  of  unemployment  and  sick- 
ness. They  are  the  most  illiterate  of  all  the 
immigrant  races  coming  to  America,  and  the 
government  has  instructed  the  Federal  attor- 
neys everywhere  to  oppose  their  being  granted 
citizenship  papers.  The  Commission  says  their 
assimilative  qualities  appear  to  be  the  lowest 
of  any  race  in  the  West,  not  barring  the 
Chinese,  and  that  the  mass  of  Western  people 


208  THE  IMMIGRANT 

oppose  their  coming  as  they  oppose  that  of  no 
other  race. 

The  Commission  did  not  investigate  the 
Chinese  question  generally,  it  having  become 
largely  a  minor  issue,  but  it  did  conclude  from 
evidence  presented  that  there  are  fewer 
Chinese  in  the  cities  of  the  West  than  formerly. 
The  coming  of  the  Chinese  began  about  the 
time  of  the  discovery  of  gold  in  California. 
In  the  late  seventies  Chinese  immigration  be- 
came a  live  issue.  California  passed  much  in- 
effective state  and  local  legislation,  and  finally 
appealed  to  the  government  to  stop  the  immi- 
gration of  Chinese  labour.  Congress  passed 
an  exclusion  act,  but  it  was  vetoed  by  President 
Hayes.  Then  it  was  asserted  that  the  agitation 
was  not  the  result  of  a  general  public  sentiment 
but  only  the  mouthings  of  those  whose  opinions 
were  not  entitled  to  respect  by  the  lawmakers  of 
the  nation.  In  answer,  California  submitted 
the  whole  matter  to  a  referendum  before  the 
people.  The  result  was  that  out  of  162,000 
votes  cast  only  a  few  hundred  were  registered 
against  exclusion.  With  this  evidence  of  the 
unanimity  of  sentiment  Congress  passed,  and 
President  Arthur  signed,  the  Exclusion  Law 
of  1882,  although  previously  he  had  vetoed  a 
bill  because  of  some  of  the  provisions  contained 
in  the  approved  measure. 


IMMIGRANTS  FROM  ASIA        209 

In  1886,  after  there  had  been  some  minor 
legislation  in  1884,  China  proposed  a  new 
treaty,  which  was  signed,  excluding  the 
Chinese  for  twenty  years.  The  Senate 
amended  the  treaty  in  several  minor  matters, 
and  then  China  refused  to  accept  it.  In  this 
state  of  affairs  President  Cleveland  signed  a 
law  carrying  into  effect  the  subject-matter  of 
the  treaty.  Exclusion  was  made  even  more 
rigid  by  the  law  of  1892,  which  provided  that 
all  Chinese  in  the  United  States  who  did  not 
register  their  presence  within  a  year,  should 
be  deported.  Its  constitutionality  was  attacked, 
but  upheld  by  the  Supreme  Court.  Mean- 
while, some  90,000  Chinese  failed  to  register 
and  were  liable  to  deportation.  As  it  was 
found  that  it  would  cost  some  six  million  dol- 
lars to  deport  them,  the  time  for  registration 
was  extended. 

In  1894  China  negotiated  a  treaty  upon  the 
subject,  which  was  ratified  and  which  provided 
for  the  exclusion  of  all  Chinese  labourers  for 
a  period  of  ten  years.  In  1902  there  was  some 
further  legislation,  and  when  the  ten  year 
period,  provided  by  the  treaty,  expired  in  1904 
and  China  refused  to  recognize  the  American 
contention  further,  Congress  passed  a  law  ex- 
cluding Chinese  labour  indefinitely,  without 
any    reference    to    China's    views    upon    the 


210  THE  IMMIGRANT 

subject.  That  is  the  law  in  force  to-day. 
Because  of  the  devious  ways  which  the  Chinese 
use  in  smuggling  themselves  into  Uncle  Sam's 
domains,  it  is  said  to  be  the  hardest  law  upon 
the  statute  books  to  enforce. 

The  story  of  the  restriction  of  Japanese  im- 
migration is  too  fresh  in  the  minds  of  readers 
to  need  relation  at  length.  The  anti- Japanese 
sentiment  had  been  rising  for  years,  but  was 
brought  to  a  climax  when  the  Japanese  refused 
to  send  their  children  to  the  separate  schools 
established  for  them,  and  sought  to  force  their 
way  into  the  white  schools.  President  Roose- 
velt sent  Secretary  Metcalf  to  make  an  investi- 
gation, and  upon  the  strength  of  Metcalf 's 
report  Roosevelt  went  so  far  as  privately  to 
threaten  to  make  California  come  to  terms  by 
force  of  arms.  The  upshot  of  the  whole  matter 
was  an  agreement  between  the  two  govern- 
ments that  no  Japanese  should  be  admitted 
who  did  not  possess  a  passport,  and  that  pass- 
ports should  not  be  issued  to  labourers. 


XXVI 

HOW  THE   "NEW"   IMMIGRANT 
LIVES 

A  STUDY  of  the  conditions  under  which 
the  new  immigrant  lives  after  coming 
to  America,  serves  to  convince  the  stu- 
dent that  he  is  often  something  of  a  hero.  He' 
often  lives  in  filth  and  squalor,  but  frequently 
it  is  necessity  that  compels  him  to  do  so.  He  is 
sometimes  found  in  camps  where  conditions 
are  so  bad  that  they  would  make  the  best  of 
us  indifferent,  but  he  lives  in  this  way  so  that 
he  may  provide  for  his  family,  present  or 
prospective.  If  he  has  a  family  with  him  in 
America,  he  shows  himself  provident  of  heart 
by  bearing  uncomplainingly  the  hardships  of 
to-day  in  order  that  his  family's  needs  may  be 
met  to-morrow. 

The  hundreds  of  thousands  of  immigrants 
who  live  in  camps  lead  an  isolated  life.  Their 
daily  existence  is  little  more  than  working, 
eating,  sleeping  in  endless  round.  They  live  in 
shacks,  have  about  as  few  of  the  creature  com- 
forts as  men  may  have,  and  their  only  diver- 
211 


212  THE  IMMIGRANT 

sions  are  drinking  and  gambling.  Here  is  a 
picture  of  camp  life  on  a  great  engineering 
project — the  New  York  Barge  Canal — drawn 
by  Peter  Roberts: 

"  Italians  formed  the  major  part  of  the  la- 
bour force,  and  the  accommodations  furnished 
most  of  them  were  shameful.  We  saw  men 
crawling  into  pens  which  few  Americans  would 
have  their  dogs  occupy.  The  cooking  these  men 
did  was  not  elaborate;  it  was  easier  and  pleas- 
anter  to  get  a  loaf  of  bread,  a  piece  of  bologna, 
and  a  bottle  o  f  beer  at  the  commissary.  In  these 
camps  the  commissary  boss  is  supreme,  and 
the  men  must  buy  of  him  if  they  wish  to  retain 
their  jobs.  He  has  both  wet  and  dry  goods 
for  sale,  and  believes  in  charging  all  the  traffic 
will  bear.  Often  he  collects  a  fee  for  each 
man  to  whom  he  gives  work.  The  coarse,  vul- 
gar elements  of  human  nature  come  to  the 
fore;  the  indecent  story,  the  vulgar  joke,  and 
the  immoral  picture  are  passed  around.  Con- 
ditions of  this  kind  can  only  be  duplicated  in 
some  towns  in  southern  Italy.  The  workmen 
are  removed  from  all  agencies  that  mould  and 
shape  coming  Americans;  deprived  of  the  re- 
fining influences  of  women  and  the  soothing 
touch  of  childhood." 

The  women  of  the  immigrant  community 
appreciate   the    help    and    encouragement    of 


HOW  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANTS  LIVE     213 

American  women — something  they  do  not 
often  get.  The  life  of  these  women  is  seldom 
easy  and  often  hard  and  dreary.  Their  homes 
have  many  births  and  many  deaths.  They  are 
as  meek  and  submissive  in  the  home  as  the  men 
are  at  work.  An  instance  of  what  a  good 
American  may  do  is  that  of  a  Pennsylvania 
woman  who  visits  the  houses  of  the  poor  im- 
migrant women  in  her  community  and  carries 
to  them  the  gospel  of  cleanliness.  Oiten  these 
mothers  protest  that  there  is  some  good  in 
dirt  and  vermin.  But  the  sweet  cleanliness 
of  the  visitor  comes  in  and  the  parasites  go  out. 
She  teaches  them  how  to  feed  their  children, 
and  then  invites  them  to  little  meetings  which 
she  holds.  They  come  washed  and  neatly 
dressed,  and  from  month  to  month  their  homes 
grow  better  kept  and  their  burdens  grow 
lighter. 

High  rents  and  a  desire  to  save  produce 
overcrowding  among  the  poor,  native  or  immi- 
grant, but  especially  among  the  latter.  In  a 
small  house  in  Omaha,  forty-six  Greeks  lived 
and  ate  and  slept.  In  an  eastern  city  a  Ruthe- 
nian,  his  wife,  their  two  children,  and  seven 
boarders  occupied  one  room.  In  another 
boarding-house  forty-two  foreigners  lived  in 
four  rooms,  each  room  thirteen  feet  square; 
while  in  another  place  twenty-four  foreigners 


214  THE  IMMIGRANT 

lived  in  one  room  fifteen  by  eighteen  feet.  In 
some  of  the  boarding-houses  the  beds  are  used 
in  two  shifts — by  day  workers  at  night  and 
by  night  workers  in  the  daytime. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  phases  of  the  in- 
vestigation of  the  immigration  problem  made 
by  the  Immigration  Commission  concerned  the 
condition  of  the  homes  of  immigrants  in  cities. 
Perhaps  the  most  striking  result  was  the  show- 
ing of  the  large  percentage  of  clean  homes 
among  immigrants,  in  spite  of  their  being 
forced  so  often  to  reside  in  districts  where 
proper  standards  of  cleanliness  are  hardest  to 
maintain.  The  investigation  covered  more 
than  ten  thousand  households,  in  which  lived 
upward  of  fifty  thousand  people.  These  house- 
holds were  located  in  New  York,  Chicago, 
Philadelphia,  Boston,  Cleveland,  Buffalo,  and 
Milwaukee.  Four-fifths  of  these  households 
were  in  apartments  of  four  rooms  or  less.  A 
third  of  them  were  four-room  apartments,  and 
nearly  a  third  were  three-room  apartments. 
While  nearly  all  of  the  households  of  the  new 
immigration  had  about  five  people  for  every 
two  sleeping-rooms,  they  still  managed  to  keep 
things  fairly  clean  in  a  large  majority  of  their 
homes.  In  more  than  half  of  the  households 
of  the  foreigners  they  had  but  one  room  out- 
side of  the  sleeping-rooms,  and  in  one-eighth 


HOW  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANTS  LIVE     215 

of  them  they  had  no  rooms  except  the  sleeping- 
rooms. 

In  more  than  one- fourth  of  the  foreign 
households  boarders  were  kept,  while  in  only 
one-tenth  of  the  native  households  were  board- 
ers found.  As  is  the  rule  in  most  things,  the  , 
children  of  immigrants  seem  to  be  about  half 
American  and  half  foreigners  in  this  respect. 
One-sixth  of  their  households  have  boarders. 
The  equipment  of  the  average  foreigner's  home 
was  only  about  half  as  good  as  that  of  native 
Americans,  in  such  matters  as  water  supply, 
toilet  accommodations,  and  other  facilities. 
All  of  these  conveniences  are  found  much  more 
frequently  among  the  people  of  the  "  old " 
immigration  than  among  those  of  the  "  new." 
And  yet,  in  spite  of  all  the  drawbacks  of  over- 
crowding, keeping  boarders,  having  only  one 
room  they  did  not  have  to  sleep  in,  lacking 
proper  equipment,  and  the  like,  only  one- 
seventh  of  the  Syrians  had  homes  in  which 
conditions  were  bad,  only  one-fifth  of  the 
Slovenians,  only  one-sixth  of  the  Slovaks, 
Poles,  and  Hebrews,  and  only  one-tenth  of  the 
Magyars. 

The  foreigners  of  the  new  immigration  are 
famous  for  their  societies.  It  is  estimated  that}' 
there  are  a  hundred  national  societies  of  one 
kind  or  another  among  the  Italians  ot\the 


216  THE  IMMIGRANT 

country.  There  are  estimated  to  be  seven 
thousand  societies  and  clubs  of  all  kinds  among 
the  Poles  of  the  country,  and  they  have  an 
aggregate  membership  of  some  800,000. 
Among  the  Slovenians  there  are  some  fifteen 
hundred  clubs  and  societies,  with  a  total  mem- 
bership approximating  125,000.  Among  the 
Slavic  peoples  in  Europe  there  is  a  communal 
tendency.  The  lands  near  the  villages  are  cul- 
tivated on  a  communal  basis  and  all  prosper,  or 
starve,  together.  Their  societies  and  clubs  in 
the  United  States  are  a  reflection  of  this. 

There  are  a  large  number  of  church  organi- 
zations. Some  of  these  pay  sick  and  death 
benefits,  and  nearly  all  of  them  are  under  the 
ultimate  control  of  the  spiritual  advisers  of  the 
people.  There  are  also  many  secular  organiza- 
tions looking  to  the  protection  of  their  mem- 
bers in  case  of  sickness  and  death.  The 
Italian  government  always  has  taken  a  deep 
interest  in  the  Italian  immigrant,  and  has  in- 
stituted a  protective  society  for  Italian  labour, 
which  is  supported  partly  by  a  government 
appropriation  and  partly  by  monthly  payments 
from  its  members.  Among  the  Poles  there  are 
a  large  number  of  military  societies.  Usually 
there  are  one  or  more  such  societies  in  every 
Polish  centre,  and  the  members  are  drilled  like 
soldiers.     A  Polish  priest  has  estimated  that 


HOW  "  NEW  "  IMMIGRANTS  LIVE     217 

there  are  20,000  Poles  receiving  some  sort  of  \ 
military  training  in  the  United  States,  in  antici- 
pation of  the  day  when  their  beloved  Poland 
attempts  to  free  itself  from  the  grip  of  Russia. 

The  main  body  of  the  "  new  "  immigration 
is  Catholic.  Out  of  a  million  immigrants  ar- 
riving probably  six  hundred  thousand  are  of 
Catholic  affiliations.  It  is  estimated  that  dur- 
ing the  past  twenty  years  ten  million  Catholics 
have  come  to  America.  To  shepherd  these 
millions  of  souls,  speaking  thirty  different 
languages,  to  soothe  race  hatred  and  national 
prejudices,  and  do  the  many  other  things  that 
such  a  situation  involves,  are  problems  the  like 
of  which  no  ecclesiastical  body  ever  has  had 
to  meet. 

When  the  foreigner  takes  his  recreation  it  is 
usually  in  a  spirit  of  relaxation.  They  go  at 
their  games  in  a  leisurely,  easy-going  way,  that 
is  not  calculated  to  quicken  the  pulse  or  excite 
the  enthusiasm.  They  love  their  holidays,  how- 
ever, and  have  as  many  of  them  as  the  ex- 
igencies of  their  employment  will  permit. 
Holy  and  festal  days  and  weddings  and  christ- 
enings are  happy  times  with  them. 

Largely  banished  by  poverty  to  the  poorer 
parts  of  our  cities,  compelled  by  circumstances 
to  live  among  surroundings  that  are  often  un- 
wholesome, in  neighbourhoods  that  frequently 


218  THE  IMMIGRANT 

are  skirted  by  the  worst  elements  of  our  native 
life,  treated  with  contempt  by  the  majority  of 
the  native  population,  it  is  no  wonder  that  the 
immigrant  often  seems  unresponsive  to  Ameri- 
can ideals  and  disposed  to  hold  out  against  a^ 
process  of  assimilation.  Men  and  women  who 
patiently  can  bear  the  things  that  the  average 
"  new  "  immigrant  must  bear,  are,  according  to 
those  who  know  them  best,  men  who  will  leave 
after  them  a  progeny  worthy  of  their  adopted 
country. 


XXVII 
SOME  UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS 

THAT  there  are  still  many  unsolved  prob- 
lems in  the  handling  of  the  immigrant 
tide  coming  to  America  is  a  fact  patent 
to  every  student  of  the  question.  Some  of 
these  problems  are  so  knotty  as  to  baffle  the 
most  earnest  attempts  to  settle  them  fully  and 
•satisfactorily.  Most  prominent  among  them  is 
the  question  of  qualifications  for  entering  the 
country.  The  House  of  Representatives  insists 
that  the  situation  demands  an  educational  quali- 
fication for  entrance.  That  there  is  a  very 
large  percentage  of  ignorant  immigrants  com- 
ing into  the  United  States  from  eastern  and 
southern  Europe,  the  figures  of  the  Bureau  of 
Immigration  prove.  More  than  a  third  of  the 
Syrians,  Ruthenians,  and  South  Italians  are  un- 
able to  read;  more  than  a  fourth  of  the  Croa- 
tians,  Russians,  and  Servians;  and  more  than 
a  fifth  of  the  Bulgarians,  Greeks,  Lithuanians, 
and  Poles,  are  in  the  same  category.  A  liter- 
^acy  test  would  keep  these  people  out. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  American  nation 
219 


22©  THE  IMMIGRANT 

tens  of  thousands  of  people  who  were  unable 
to  read  or  write  came  to  the  United  States  and 
became  the  progenitors  of  families  who  to-day 
form  a  part  of  the  bone  and  sinew  of  the  na- 
tion, and  there  are  many  who  assert  that  his- 
tory is  but  repeating  itself;  that  among  those 
who  are  coming  now,  who  cannot  read  or  write, 
there  are  tens  of  thousands  who  will  become 
the  progenitors  of  families  who  will  add  much 
to  our  national  human  capital.  It  is  claimed 
that  it  is  not  the  uneducated  foreigner  who  be- 
comes our  anarchist,  our  alien  agitator,  or  our 
rebel  against  American  institutions;  that  an 
illiterate  man  with  an  open  mind  may  be  much 
more  fit  for  admission  into  our  country  than 
the  literate  one  with  a  mind  filled  with  enmity' 
against  our  institutions. 

Those  who  favour  the  literacy  test  declare/ 
that  our  tide  of  immigrants  is  now  so  large 
that  there  are  difficulties  surrounding  its  as- 
similation, and  that  the  time  has  come  when  we 
can  pick  out  immigrants  with  greater  care  and 
make  it  a  select  body  rather  than  one  that  has 
not  been  filtered  of  the  undesirables.  They 
contend  that  with  our  present  supply  of  incom- 
ing foreigners  it  is  better  that  two  fit  persons 
be  excluded  than  that  one  unfit  be  admitted. 
They  feel  that  even  with  the  restrictions  drawn 
so  close  as  to  keep  out  all  illiterates,  we  still 


SOME  UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS     221 

will  have  leeway  enough  to  choose  a  sufficient 
number  of  good  immigrants  to  tax  the  assimi-j 
lable  powers  of  the  nation.  They  do  not  assert 
that  every  illiterate  alien  is  a  bad  citizen,  or 
that  even  the  majority  of  them  are;  they  argue 
that  a  good  immigrant  who  can  read  and 
write  is  better  than  a  good  one  who  cannot, 
and  that  there  are  enough  of  the  former  with- 
out having  to  take  the  latter. 

The  majority  of  those  who  favour  a  restricted    * 
immigration  predicated  upon  the  belief  that 
the  tide  has  become  too  large  for  assimilation 
to  keep  pace  with  expansion,  favour  the  literacy 
test  as  the  best  method  of  checking  it.     But 
other  methods  have  been  proposed  to  accom- 
plish the  same  result.     One  of  these  is  the. 
limitation  of  the  number  of  immigrants  ad- 
mitted by  restricting  the  number  of  each  race 
to  a  certain  percentage.     This  would  simply 
accept  all  that  come  as  now,  literate  and  illiter- 
ate, up  to  a  certain  number  and  prevent  us  from 
exercising  a  preference  for  literates  over  il- 
literates. 
**■*-  Still  another  proposition  for  restriction  is1 
to  exclude  all  unskilled  labourers  who  do  not 
come  with  their  wives  or  families.    It  is  argued 
by  those  who  urge  this  method  of  restriction, 
that  those  who  come  unaccompanied  are  usu- 
ally men  who  are  coming  over  for  the  pur- 


222  THE  IMMIGRANT 

pose  of  working  a  few  years  and  then  return- 
ing home.  It  is  declared  that  they  tend  to 
restrict  the  opportunities  of  labourers  who 
come  with  their  wives  and  families.  It  gen- 
erally is  agreed  that  the  man  who  comes  with 
his  wife  or  his  family  comes  with  the  intent 
of  making  America  his  home — an  intent  that; 
tends  to  make  a  good  citizen  of  him.  Those 
who  oppose  this  plan  agree  that  there  is  much 
in  what  its  advocates  say,  but,  on  the  other  hand, 
there  are  so  many  labourers  who  come  over 
and  get  money  enough  to  bring  their  wives  or 
families  later  that  the  provision  would  shut 
out  tens  of  thousands  of  the  very  people  it 
was  meant  to  help — the  men  who  want  to  make 
America  their  home  and  the  home  of  their 
posterity. 

Another  method  proposed  for  restricting  im-^ 
migration  is  to  limit  the  number  of  immigrants 
...  arriving  at  any  one  port  in  any  one  year.  By 
this  method,  it  is  urged,  New  York  could  be 
saved  from  the  great  congestion  that  exists 
there,  and  the  tide  of  humanity  could  be  bet- 
ter distributed  to  all  parts  of  the  country.  This/ 
plan  is  opposed  by  others  because  it  would 
throw  the  immigrant  traffic  out  of  its  natural 
channels.  Still  another  method  proposed  is 
that  of  raising  the  head  tax  on  all  immigrants 
or  of  raising  it  on  those  who  are  unaccom-* 


SOME  UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS     223 

panied  by  their  wives  or  families.     The  Im-«I 
migration  Commission  concluded  unanimously  j 
that    restriction    is    demanded    by    economic, 
moral,   and   social   considerations,   but   it  re- 
jected every  plan  of  restriction  except  the  lit- 
eracy test. 

"  It  is  generally  conceded  that  the  immigrant- 
handling  business  is  such  a  profitable  one  that 
the  steamship  companies  take  many  chances 
of  being  fined  a  hundred  dollars,  or  of  being 
required  to  carry  back  an  excludable  immi- 
grant. It  has  been  recommended  that  the 
fines  be  made  so  heavy  for  a  lack  of  compliance 
with  the  law  as  to  render  it  a  dangerous  thing  k 
for  a  steamship  company  to  accept  passengers 
whom  they  should  not  bring  over,  or  even  to 
connive  at  the  coming  of  deportable  persons. 
The  deported  immigrant  has  a  hard  life  of  it. 
He  has  staked  his  all  to  come,  and  when  the 
steamship  carries  him  back  it  is  to  dump  him 
in  some  foreign  port,  without  funds,  to  con- 
tinue his  journey  home.  Some  have  proposed 
that  inspection  should  be  made  at  the  ports  of 
embarkation,  but  the  immigration  authorities 
do  not  agree  with  this.  They  say  that  it  would 
be  a  case  of  beginning  at  the  big  end  of  the 
funnel.  Where  countries  are  willing  to  assist 
their  immigrants,  as  in  Italy  and  Russia,  the 
Public  Health  Service  stations  its  men  at  the 


2M  THE  IMMIGRANT 

ports  of  embarkation,  and  their  recommenda- 
tions as  to  who  will  be  admitted  and  who  are 
likely  to  be  excluded,  are  accepted  by  the  gov- 
ernments in  question  and  by  the  steamship  com- 
panies. In  this  way  the  evils  of  deportation 
are  reduced  to  a  minimum. 

-—  It  is  generally  conceded  that  some  methodf 
must  be  found  of  filtering  out  the  criminals 

„who  come  in  on  the  immigrant  tide.  The  im- 
migration authorities  catch  a  large  percentage 
of  them,  but  there  are  still  too  many  over- 
looked. It  has  been  proposed  that  wherever 
possible  the  immigrant  be  required  to  show  a 
clean  bill  of  health  in  the  shape  of  a  certificate 
from  his  government  showing  that  he  is  not  the* 
possessor  of  a  criminal  record.  Another  pro-  ■ 
posal  is  that  any  alien  convicted  of  a  crime 
within  five  years  after  he  comes,  shall  be  im- 
mediately deported,  or  deported  as  soon  as  his 
prison  sentence  ends. 

The  problem  of  distribution  of  immigrants 
so  as  to  keep  them  out  of  the  cities  and  to  lead 
them  to  the  land,  has  had  many  solutions  pro- 
posed, and  yet  few  of  them  seem  likely  to 
accomplish  their  purpose.  The  most  interest-^ 
ing  of  these  is  the  proposal  to  establish  a  zone 
of  a  hundred  miles'  radius  around  each  port 
of  entry,  and  to  admit  no  alien  who  does  not 
possess  a  railroad  ticket  for  some  point  beyond 


SOME  UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS     225 

that  zone.  This  proposition  is  objected  to  by 
others  on  several  grounds.  One  is  that  the 
ports  themselves  would  hardly  be  willing  to 
accept  such  conditions.  For  instance,  over- 
crowded as  New  York  is  to-day,  does  one  sup- 
pose it  would  be  willing  to  let  the  immigrant 
tide  pass  out  of  its  gates  without  a  fair  toll 
of  humanity  from  it?  Another  objection  is 
that  this  would  be  only  a  process  of  filling  the 
coffers  of  the  railroads;  that  the  immigrant 
might  go  beyond  the  zone  in  question,  but 
would  likely  drift  back  again. 
^A  serious  problem  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
immigrant  is  how  to  avert  the  unpleasant  con- 
ditions of  the  detention  rooms  of  immigrant 
stations.  In  most  of  the  stations  the  size  of 
the  rooms  is  adequate  for  the  ordinary  needs  of 
the  traffic,  but,  for  instance,  in  the  case  of  Ellis 
Island,  the  steamship  companies  to-day  may 
dump  five  thousand  immigrants  out  of  their 
steerage  quarters.  Perhaps  three-fifths  of 
these  will  go  through  all  right,  but  the  other 
two  thousand  must  be  detained  for  further 
examination.  It  is  inevitable  under  such  con- 
ditions that  there  will  be  crowding  in  the  de- 
tention rooms.  And  where  perhaps  half  of  the 
detained  know  next  to  nothing  about  cleanli- 
ness, and  no  insignificant  percentage  of  them 
arrive  with  vermin  of  one  kind  or  another  on 


226  THE  IMMIGRANT 

their  persons,  it  is  inevitable  that  the  deten- 
tion rooms  will  not  always  be  clean.  At  Ellis 
Island  every  one  admits  that  there  long  has 
been  imperative  need  of  more  room,  and  yet, 
with  all  the  room  that  a  liberal  government 
might  provide,  conditions  would  in  all  likeli- 
hood remain  such  as  would  grate  upon  the 
sensibilities  of  people  who  love  cleanliness. 


XXVIII 

THE  PROBLEMS  OF  OTHER 
COUNTRIES 

THERE  are  five  leading  countries  which 
are  now  making  a  bid  for  immigrants, 
and  which  are  able  to  accommodate 
millions  of  them.  There  are  few  countries  in 
the  New  World  which  do  not  wish  a  healthy 
influx  of  new  blood,  but  only  Canada,  Argen- 
tina, and  Brazil  have  gone  about  the  matter  in 
a  careful  and  systematic  way.  In  the  Old 
World,  Australia  and  New  Zealand  are  stand- 
ing in  the  market-place  of  humanity  trying  to 
induce  the  emigrant  to  bend  his  footsteps  their 
way. 

Canada  offers  an  interesting  example  of  a 
country  with  a  definite  immigration  policy,  a 
policy  that  consists  of  recognizing  the  country's 
peculiar  needs  and  then  enacting  a  law  suffi- 
ciently broad  and  flexible  to  meet  those  needs. 
There  are  two  characteristics  about  the  Cana- 
dian immigration  policy — the  one  is  to  attract 
settlers  to  the  land  and  the  other  is  to  dis- 
courage the  coming  of  such  immigrants  as  tend 
227 


228  THE  IMMIGRANT 

to  congregate  in  cities  and  towns.  The  United 
States,  the  United  Kingdom,  and  certain  other 
countries  of  northern  and  western  Europe  are 
regarded  as  furnishing  the  kind  of  people 
Canada  needs  for  its  upbuilding,  and  the 
Dominion  government  has  carried  on  a  propa- 
ganda that  has  been  carefully  wrought  out 
and  successfully  conducted.  The  Canadians 
ido  not  try  to  attract  immigration  from  south- 
ern and  eastern  Europe.  In  fact,  they  let  it 
be  known  that  unless  such  immigrants  are 
headed  for  the  land  and  not  for  the  cities 
•Canada  would  rather  they  would  stay  at  home. 

In  the  earlier  years  Canada  shared  with  the 
United  States  in  the  immigration  from  west- 
ern and  northern  Europe  to  some  extent, 
though  until  the  railroads  were  extended  into 
the  great  prairie  region  of  Middle  Canada  and 
British  Columbia,  the  bulk  of  this  immigra- 
tion remained  in  the  United  States.  But  when 
it  finally  went  into  Canada  there  followed  a 
propaganda  that  has  been  remarkable  for  the 
success  that  has  attended  it,  and  Canada  has 
become  one  of  the  great  immigrant-receiving 
nations  of  the  world. 

The  most  significant  feature  about  the 
Canadian  immigration  laws  is  the  latitude  and 
'discretionary  power  vested  in  the  immigration 
authorities.    A  picked  immigration  is  wanted, 


OTHER  COUNTRIES'  PROBLEMS     229 

and  the  immigration  authorities  are  permitted 
to  do  the  selecting  without  being  hampered  on 
every  hand. 

In  the  propaganda  work  much  advertising 
is  done,  advertising  by  circulars,  through  the 
newspapers,  through  permanent  exhibits  in  big 
cities,  and  by  travelling  exhibits  in  smaller 
ones.  And  then  Canada  pays  a  liberal  bonus 
to  several  thousand  booking  agents  in  the  coun- 
tries from  which  immigrants  are  sought.  A 
bonus  of  $4.86  is  paid  for  each  immigrant  of. 
certain  classes  who  is  enlisted  for  Canada.  It 
is  given  for  such  immigrants  as  have  been  for 
at  least  one  year  engaged  in  the  occupation  of 
farmer,  farm  labourer,  gardener,  stableman, 
carter,  railway  surfaceman,  miner,  or  navvy, 
and  who  declares  his  intention  of  following 
farming  or  railway  construction  in  Canada. 
Grants  are  also  made  to  the  Salvation  Army 
for  the  purpose  of  assisting  people  to  come  to 
Canada. 

Another  plan  that  Canada  has  hit  upon  to 
encourage  immigration  is  to  appoint  successful 
immigrant  farmers  as  delegates  to  Great 
Britain,  paying  them  to  go  about  the  United' 
Kingdom  and  tell  the  people  of  the  wonderful 
opportunities  in  Canada.  The  result  of  the 
Canadian  campaign  and  the  Canadian  policy 
is  that  seven-tenths  of  Canada's  immigration 


280  THE  IMMIGRANT 

to-day  is  from  northern  and  western  Europe, 
t  while  eight-tenths  of  ours  is  from  southern 
and  eastern  Europe.  Two-thirds  of  all  the 
homesteads  entered  during  the  past  decade 
were  taken  up  by  immigrants  from  Europe  and 
the  United  States,  and  of  these  the  United 
States  furnished  nearly  half. 

Canada  is  also  bidding  for  the  immigration 
*of  poor  and  homeless  British  children.  These 
are  brought  over  under  government  super- 
vision, and  placed  in  homes  where  they  can 
grow  up  with  the  country  and  have  a  chance 
to  become  homesteaders  in  their  own  right. 
It  is  estimated  that  in  the  past  fifty  years  more 
than  sixty  thousand  of  these  children  have 
been  placed  in  the  homes  of  Canadian  farmers. 
How  much  greater  the  demand  for  the  chil- 
dren is  than  the  supply,  may  be  inferred  from 
the  statement  that  in  nine  years  nineteen  thou- 
sand juveniles  were  sent  over,  whereas  there 
were  received  130,000  applications  for  chil- 
dren. 

Since  the  establishment  of  the  Australian 
Commonwealth  in  1901,  immigration  has  be- 
come a  national  question.  The  general  out- 
\  line  of  the  policy  pursued  is  that  Asiatics  and 
Pacific  Islanders  are  excluded  and  a  general 
plan  of  making  the  continent  a  "  white  Aus- 
tralia" is  followed.     Australia  has  an  area 


OTHER  COUNTRIES'  PROBLEMS     231 

exactly  duplicating  the  area  of  the  landed  part 
of  continental  United  States,  and  yet  it  has  a 
population  only  one-eighteenth  as  great  as  that 
of  the  United  States.  More  than  half  of  its 
lands  is  unoccupied,  and  a  billion  acres  await 
settlement.  In  order  to  induce  settlers  to  take 
up  unoccupied  land,  the  government  allows 
them  to  purchase  the  freehold  by  the  payment 
of  half-yearly  installments.  Advances  are 
made  for  the  improvement  of  the  lands  in  all 
the  states  except  Tasmania.  In  order  to  stimu- 
late immigration  from  the  United  Kingdom) 
some  of  the  states  pay  wholly,  or  in  part,  the 
transportation  expenses  of  persons  desiring  to 
settle  on  the  land  or  to  engage  in  farm  or  dairy 
work,  or  occupations  of  a  similar  nature.  Do- 
mestic servants  and  other  desirable  settlers  are 
likewise  aided  to  make  the  journey.  To  date 
more  than  seven  hundred  thousand  immigrants 
have  been  assisted  in  Australia  in  this  way. 
Great  Britain  is  now  furnishing  immigrants  to 
Australia  at  the  rate  of  about  sixty  thousand 
a  year,  and  this  represents  more  than  four- 
fifths  of  Australia's  immigration. 

Australia  has  a  literacy  test.    It  requires  that ' 
no  one  may  enter  the  commonwealth  who  can- 
not write  at  least  fifty  words  dictated  to  him 
by  an  immigration  official.    This  test  may  be 
repeated  at  any  time  within  a  year  after  the 


232  THE  IMMIGRANT 

arrival  of  the  immigrant,  and  if  he  fails  to  pass 
it  he  may  be  deported.  However,  in  practice 
this  test  is  applied  only  to  the  immigrants  of 
'those  countries  where  exclusion  is  desirable. 

New  Zealand  has  an  area  about  the  size  of 
Colorado,  and  it  has  a  population  approximat- 
ing a  million,  of  which  a  fourth  was  born  in 
the  United  Kingdom.  The  tide  of  immigra- 
tion is  not  a  very  extended  one,  and  now  comes 
mainly  from  Australia.  In  eight  years  it  num- 
bered more  than  a  quarter-million  souls,  three- 
fourths  of  them  from  Australia.  New  Zealand 
has  for  years  co-operated  with  the  steamship 
companies  in  securing  reduced  rates  for  desir- 
able settlers. 

The  Argentine  Republic  has  a  population  of 
about  five  persons  to  the  square  mile,  as  com- 
pared with  25.75  for  the  United  States.  Out 
of  its  three-quarters  of  a  billion  acres  of  land, 
only  about  three  hundred  million  acres  are 
arable,  and  out  of  the  arable  land  only  one- 
eighth  is  under  cultivation.  In  addition  to  its 
vast  grain-producing  possibilities,  much  of  its 
territory  is  admirably  adapted  to  grazing,  and 
it  has  immense  timber  and  mineral  resources 
as  yet  all  but  untouched.  The  Constitution 
itself  provides  for  the  encouragement  of  immi- 
gration, and  guarantees  to  the  immigrant  the 
same  civil  rights  enjoyed  by  citizens.    All  im- 


OTHER  COUNTRIES'  PROBLEMS     233 

migrants  are  exempted  by  the  Constitution 
from  military  service  for  a  period  of  ten  years, 
and  the  government  is  expressly  denied  the 
power  to  restrict,  limit,  or  burden  with  taxes 
of  any  kind  the  foreigners  coming  to  it  to 
cultivate  the  soil,  to  improve  its  industries,  or 
to  introduce  and  teach  the  sciences  and  arts. 

Within  a  period  of  forty-five  years  Argen- 
tina's gates  have  swung  inward  to  upward  of 
five  million  souls,  and  they  are  now  coming 
at  the  rate  of  about  three  hundred  thousand  a 
year.  Of  these  some  ninety  thousand  come 
from  Italy  and  about  125,000  from  Spain. 
The  government  provides  generously  for  the 
immigrant.  He  is  given  five  days'  free  board 
at  the  expense  of  the  nation  after  he  lands,  is 
carried  to  his  destination  from  the  port  of 
debarkation  at  the  expense  of  the  government, 
and  has  his  wearing  apparel,  household  goods, 
and  the  implements  of  his  trade  admitted  free. 
These  provisions  apply  also  to  his  children. 
They  are  supported  at  the  expense  of  the  gov- 
ernment for  a  period  of  not  to  exceed  ten 
days,  until  they  have  opportunity  to  settle  down. 
This  applies  to  those  who  go  out  into  the 
provinces  as  settlers.  At  the  expiration  of  this 
time  they  may  still  be  boarded  and  quartered  at 
a  charge  of  fifty  cents  a  day  for  adults  and  half 
rates  for  children.    In  case  of  serious  sickness 


234?  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  state  continues  to  support  the  immigrant 
as  long  as  his  illness  lasts. 

Brazil  is  larger  than  continental  United 
States  and  the  Kingdom  of  Spain  together,  yet 
it  has  only  two-ninths  as  many  people  within  its 
boundaries  as  the  United  States.  The  govern- 
ment wants  immigrants  and  wants  them  badly. 
It  is  willing  to  provide  them  with  free  trans- 
portation to  Brazil,  to  transport  them  free  to 
their  destination  from  the  port  of  debarkation, 
to  provide  them  with  free  tools  and  seeds,  and 
with  medicine  and  care  for  their  families.  It 
seeks  to  build  up  a  class  of  peasant  proprietors 
who  shall  at  the  same  time  be  available  for 
work  on  the  great  coffee  plantations.  It  now 
gets  about  seventy  thousand  immigrants  a  year, 
nine-tenths  of  them  being  Portuguese,  Italians, 
and  Spaniards. 


XXIX 
EMIGRATION  TO  CANADA 

FOR  many  years  Canada  has  made  sys- 
tematic efforts  to  promote  emigration 
from  the  United  States  to  its  dominions. 
The  propaganda  has  resulted  so  successfully 
that  nearly  one-third  of  its  immigration  comes 
from  our  country.  We  are  sending  Canada 
more  colonists  than  it  is  getting  from  England 
and  Wales  together.  Our  immigrants  are  ex- 
actly the  kind  of  people  Canada  is  looking  for, 
since  they  are  the  best  fitted  in  the  world  for 
pioneering  in  the  development  of  agricultural 
and  other  resources  in  a  new  territory.  In  less 
than  eight  years  the  United  States  has  sent 
nearly  four  hundred  thousand  people  across  the 
line. 

One  needs  only  consult  Canada's  immigra- 
tion authorities  to  see  how  much  they  want 
Uncle  Sam's  citizens  to  come  into  the  Do- 
minion. W.  J.  White,  the  press  agent  of  the 
propaganda,  says  there  is  not  a  state  in  the 
Union  in  which  Canada  is  not  advertised, 
the  offices  of  the  government  being  located  in 
235 


236  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  best  agricultural  sections  where  easy  com- 
munication with  the  surrounding  country  may 
be  established.  He  tells  how  agents  go  out  and 
meet  the  prospective  settlers;  carry  information 
to  them  and  their  friends  as  to  the  soil,  crops, 
and  the  like;  how  they  make  the  annual  rounds 
of  the  fall  agricultural  fairs  with  exhibits;  and 
how  the  general  work  is  done. 

In  addition  to  the  salaried  agents,  the  Ca- 
nadian government  employs  a  large  number 
of  sub-agents,  who  are  paid  a  bonus  of  three 
dollars  per  head  for  every  man,  two  dollars 
per  head  for  every  woman,  and  one  dollar  per 
head  for  every  child  among  the  actual  settlers 
they  secure.  The  farm  periodicals  are  used 
extensively  in  advertising  the  attractions  of 
"  the  last  best  West,"  and  the  country  weekly 
is  also  made  use  of.  Over  seven  thousand 
newspaper  advertising  contracts  were  signed 
in  a  single  year. 

Tours  of  inspection  by  editorial  associations 
and  newspaper  writers  are  arranged  at  fre- 
quent intervals,  and  they  have  been  found  of 
great  value  in  the  work  of  separating  Ameri- 
cans from  their  allegiance  to  the  Stars  and 
Stripes. 

The  Canadian  government  is  very  well  satis- 
fied with  the  results  that  have  been  achieved. 
Mr.  White  says  it  has  not  been  considered  ad- 


EMIGRATION  TO  CANADA        237 

visable  to  make  any  changes  in  the  method  of 
advertising;  that  the  plan  heretofore  pursued 
has  increased  the  inflow  of  settlers  from  the 
United  States  in  nine  years  from  one  thou- 
sand a  year  to  sixty  thousand  a  year,  and  that 
this  is  a  showing  with  which  Canada  may  be 
satisfied.  Many  of  the  immigrants  dispose  of 
their  lands  or  other  property  before  leaving 
for  Canada,  and  the  Canadian  officials  esti- 
mate that  they  bring  with  them  to  Canada 
money  and  property  amounting  to  sixty  million 
dollars  a  year. 

It  is  probable  that  nowhere  else  in  the  world  \ 
is  any  considerable  movement  made  up  so 
largely  of  agricultural  people  as  the  trek  of 
Americans  to  Canada.  More  than  three- 
fourths  of  the  Americans  going  have  been  en- 
gaged in  agriculture  or  its  allied  industries  in 
the  United  States.  During  a  period  of  eight 
years  they  took  up  seventy  thousand  homesteads 
in  the  western  provinces.  They  now  consti- 
tute nearly  half  of  the  farming  population  of 
these  provinces.  Thus  is  Canada  getting  from 
us  the  very  kind  of  people  who  transformed 
our  Middle  Western  States  from  boundless 
prairies  into  communities  which  are  the  back- 
bone of  American  agriculture,  the  very  kind 
of  people  it  would  be  most  worth  while  for  the 
United  States  to  keep.    The  Canadian  immigra- 


238  THE  IMMIGRANT 

tion  authorities  admit  that  they  have  had  to 
fight  heavy  competition  along  this  line  from 
immigration  agents  in  Texas  and  other  West- 
ern and  Southwestern  states,  and  that  the 
strongest  consideration  they  have  to  overcome 
in  inducing  emigration  is  the  reluctance  of  the 
people  to  settle  outside  the  United  States. 

For  a  long  while  the  railroads  to  Texas  and 
other  places  in  the  United  States  where  set- 
tlers are  wanted,  gave  better  rates  for  excur- 
sions of  settlers  than  those  leading  to  Canada, 
but  the  Canadian  government  now  has  secured 
rates  that  enable  it  to  compete  with  the  roads 
to  the  Southwest.  In  ten  years  Canada  spent 
approximately  two  million  dollars  in  encourag- 
ing immigration  from  the  United  States,  this 
being  almost  half  of  the  total  expenditure  for 
the  entire  immigration  propaganda  in  all  parts 
of  the  world. 

It  is  certain  that  no  other  country  labours  so 
persistently  to  attract  the  right  kind  of  people 
as  Canada,  and  it  likewise  is  certain  that  one  of 
the  reasons  our  immigration  from  the  countries 
of  northern  Europe  has  fallen  off  is  the  suc- 
cess of  the  Canadian  immigration  propaganda 
in  those  fields.  Thus  Canada  is  not  only  recruit- 
ing half  of  its  new  farming  population  from 
the  United  States  itself,  but  it  is  drawing  the 
major  portion  of  the  other  half  from  territory 


EMIGRATION  TO  CANADA       239 

which  used  to  be  the  especial  immigrant- fur- 
nishing preserves  of  the  United  States.  It  is 
hoped  that  the  movement  of  some  of  the  states 
of  sending  representatives  abroad  for  the  pur- 
pose of  building  up  our  waning  immigrant  tide 
from  northwestern  Europe  may  be  fruitful.  It 
is  realized,  however,  that  those  states  will  have 
a  keen  and  successful  competitor  in  Canada, 
and  that  our  success  in  developing  the  prairie 
region  of  the  Mississippi  Valley  is  Canada's 
greatest  argument  for  the  future  of  its  great 
grain-producing  region.  Its  slogan  of  "the 
last  best  West "  has  proved  a  most  effective 
one.  It  calls  forth  in  the  immigrant  mind  a 
twentieth  century  repetition  of  the  history  of 
Wisconsin,  Minnesota,  and  the  Dakotas. 

While  the  United  States  is  losing  its  farmer 
folk  to  Canada  in  such  large  numbers,  Canada 
is  losing  its  share  of  people  to  the  United 
States.  Approximately  one-fifth  of  all  the  peo- 
ple born  in  the  Dominion  reside  in  the  United 
States  to-day.  And  where  we  are  giving 
Canada  some  sixty  thousand  immigrants  a 
year,  it  is  responding  with  a  counter  current  of 
some  fifty  thousand  immigrants  to  the  United 
States.  Of  these,  approximately  one-half  are 
native-born  Canadians,  while  the  others  are 
naturalized  Canadians.  However,  a  relatively 
small  proportion  of  this  immigration  is  of  the 


240  THE  IMMIGRANT 

same  kind  we  are  sending  to  Canada.  It  takes 
our  farmers  and  in  return  gives  us  skilled  and 
unskilled  labourers. 

The  assertion  is  made  in  some  quarters  that 
this  exodus  of  labour  from  Canada  is  largely- 
due  to  the  incoming  tide  of  immigration,  the 
native  workmen  being  replaced  by  the  immi- 
grant and  forced  to  seek  employment  else- 
where. An  example  of  how  this  has  happened 
in  the  United  States  is  cited  in  the  case  of  many- 
American  industries  in  which  native  labour  has 
been  replaced  almost  entirely  by  immigrant  la- 
bour. In  this  connection  it  is  pointed  out,  how- 
ever, that  in  nearly  every  instance  the  effect  of 
the  coming  of  immigrant  labour  has  been  to 
force  the  native  workingman  up  and  not  out. 
The  big  supply  of  immigrant  labour  has  so 
expanded  the  industries  of  the  country  that  the 
native  workingman  has  found  a  full  supply  of 
picked  jobs  instead  of  being  forced  to  accept- 
"  the  run  of  the  mine." 

A  large  proportion  of  the  immigrants  com- 
ing from  Canada  to  the  United  States  are 
French  Canadians  who  come  to  work  in  the 
mills  of  New  England.  It  thus  happens  that 
the  tide  out  of  the  United  States  goes  largely 
from  the  Middle  West,  while  the  tide  into  the 
United  States  comes  into  the  Northeast. 
While  the  Canadians  who  come  to  the  United 


EMIGRATION  TO  CANADA       241 

States  are,  in  the  main,  a  desirable  immigra- 
tion, it  is  generally  realized  that  the  best  im- 
migrant from  an  economic  standpoint  is  the 
one  who  goes  upon  the  land,  and  therefore 
that  Canada  gets  the  better  of  us  in  the  annual, 
immigrant  exchange  between  Uncle  Sam  and" 
John  Canuck. 

The  Canadian  immigration  law,  as  pointed 
out  in  another  article  of  this  series,  is  admirably 
adapted  to  the  needs  of  a  new  country  which 
wants  the  best  class  of  immigrants.  Its  flex- 
ibility is  regarded  as  its  best  quality.  For 
instance,  any  one  getting  his  way  paid  into  the 
United  States  is  shut  out  without  question.  In 
Canada,  such  immigrants  may  be  admitted  upon 
the  approval  of  the  Canadian  immigration 
representative  in  London. 

Canada  knows  thoroughly  how  to  accomplish 
a  desired  end  without  direct  offence  against  any 
one.  Some  years  ago  Hindu  immigration  began 
to  increase  and  Canada  thought  best  to  check 
the  incoming  tide  quickly  and  completely.  But  it 
was  not  willing  to  put  itself  in  the  open  posi- 
tion of  denying  admission  to  British  subjects. 
A  little  headwork,  and  presto!  the  thing  was 
done  with  no  feelings  hurt!  Recalling  that 
there  were  no  means  on  earth  whereby  Hindus 
could  make  a  continuous  journey  from  India 
to  Canada,  the  Canadian  authorities  promul- 


242  THE  IMMIGRANT 

gated  an  order  that  no  Asiatic  would  be  ad- 
mitted who  did  not  come  by  a  continuous  jour- 
ney. British  prestige  was  protected,  but  the 
Hindus  were  completely  shut  out. 

On  the  whole,  Canada  has  an  immigration 
service  that  is  the  admiration  and  despair  of 
many  countries.  With  so  much  power  vested 
in  the  executive  branch  of  the  government,  the 
steamship  lines  are  simply  told  that  they  must 
do  this  thing  or  that,  else  their  steerage  pas- 
sengers will  be  denied  admission  to  Canada. 
Hence  the  government  gets  a  co-operation 
from  the  steamship  companies  in  filtering  the 
immigrant  stream  before  it  starts  across  the 
sea  such  as  the  United  States  authorities  never 
have  been  able  to  secure.  And  the  particular 
phase  of  the  service  which  affects  the  United 
States  to  such  a  large  degree  is  so  efficient  as 
to  be  dangerous — the  attraction  of  so  many  of 
our  best  citizens — unless  we  can  believe  that 
American  settlers  on  the  other  side  will  make 
for  more  complete  commercial  intercourse  and 
thus  neutralize  our  loss. 


XXX 

FUTURE  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS 

IT  seems  reasonable  to  assume  that  the  end 
of  the  migrations  of  man  is  still  centuries 
away,  and  that  many  a  generation  will 
rise  and  pass  beyond  earthly  concerns  before 
any  approximate  equilibrium  of  population 
will  be  established.  Indeed,  it  is  probable  that 
so  long  as  the  world  stands  economic  oppor- 
tunity will  call  peoples,  as  well  as  individuals, 
to  move  from  country  to  country,  and  from 
continent  to  continent.  A  study  of  the  map  of 
the  world  reveals  how  unequally  distributed  are 
the  people  of  the  earth,  even  when  measured 
by  the  opportunities  of  getting  a  living.  For 
instance,  Asia  has  a  population  of  fifty  per 
square  mile;  Europe  has  a  hundred  people  to 
the  square  mile;  North  America  has  fifteen; 
Africa,  eleven;  South  America,  seven;  and 
Australia,  five. 

It  must  be  plain  to  every  person  who  has  a 

reasonable  knowledge  of  the  relative  resources 

of  the  several  continents,  that  South  America 

has  the  latent  ability  to  support  fifty  people 

243 


244  THE  IMMIGRANT 

to  the  square  mile  as  easily  as  Europe  can  sup- 
port a  hundred,  and  if  that  be  true  there  is 
room  on  that  continent  for  three  hundred  mil- 
lion immigrants  and  their  descendants.  It  also 
seems  to  be  evident  from  a  comparison  of  the 
relative  resources  of  North  America  and  Asia, 
that  North  America,  with  its  up-to-date  west- 
ern-world system  of  agriculture,  manufactur- 
ing, and  commerce,  can  support  a  population  of 
a  density  equal  to  that  which  Asia  supports 
to-day  with  its  out-of-date  and  antiquated  agri- 
cultural and  industrial  methods.  If  that  be 
true,  then  North  America  might  yet  find  room 
for  three  hundred  million  souls.  Africa  is  hot 
for  the  most  part,  and  somewhat  inhospitable 
to  civilization,  and  yet  the  spread  of  the  science 
of  tropical  medicine  makes  it  as  available  a 
place  for  human  existence  as  equatorial  South 
America  in  general,  and  Panama  in  particular. 
Leaving  out  the  Great  Sahara,  it  might  support 
a  population  of  at  least  twenty-five  to  the 
square  mile,  and  that  would  mean  room  for 
an  increase  in  population  of  more  than  150,- 
000,000  souls. 

Australia,  likewise,  might  accommodate  at 
least  twenty-five  to  the  square  mile,  and  that 
would  mean  nearly  a  hundred  million  souls 
could  find  room  on  the  smallest  continent.  In 
other  words,  with  South  America  and  North 


FUTURE  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS     245 

America  having  a  population  half  as  dense  as 
that  of  Europe  and  equally  as  dense  as  that  of 
Asia;  and  with  Australia  and  Africa  having 
a  population  only  a  fourth  as  dense  as  that  of 
Europe  and  half  as  dense  as  that  of  Asia  to- 
day, there  would  be  room  for  an  immigration 
to  those  continents  of  nearly  nine  hundred  mil- 
lion souls.  As  things  stand  to-day,  Europe 
and  Asia,  with  about  two-fifths  of  the  world's 
area,  support  four-fifths  of  the  world's  popu- 
lation. 

It  naturally  follows  that  from  these  two 
continents  must  flow  the  rivers  of  humanity 
which  will  bring  the  population  of  the  earth 
to  a  common  level,  if  such  a  level  ever  is 
reached.  And  as  long  as  the  other  continents 
set  up  the  bars  against  the  Asiatic  as  they  are 
doing  to-day,  not  much  of  the  immigration 
of  the  future  can  come  from  there.  Europe 
for  centuries  witnessed  one  tide  of  humanity 
after  another  sweeping  westward  from  Asia — 
the  Celt,  the  Teuton,  the  Latin,  the  Slav— 
and  its  population  has  grown  until  it  is  now 
four  times  as  dense  as  the  rest  of  the  world. 
And  this,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  once  the 
Asiatic  tides  of  humanity  ceased  to  sweep  west- 
ward, other  tides  in  turn  started  out  of  Europe, 
whose  ends  are  not  yet,  and  which  already  have 


246  THE  IMMIGRANT 

carried  perhaps  a  hundred  million  souls  across 
the  seas  to  other  continents. 

Perhaps  the  most  interesting  probable  de- 
velopment in  human  migratory  matters  for  the 
early  future  is  the  indicated  tide  that  gives 
promise  soon  to  be  sweeping  through  the 
Panama  Canal.  All  the  world  looks  for  a 
boom  throughout  the  Americas  as  a  result  of 
the  opening  of  the  great  waterway.  And  espe- 
cially is  this  to  be  true  of  the  Pacific  sides  of 
the  two  continents.  Suddenly  all  this  vast  re- 
gion is  to  be  brought  five  thousand  miles 
nearer  to  the  immigrant  embarking  ports  of 
Europe,  five  hundred  hours  sailing  closer  for 
the  interchange  of  commerce.  Instead  of  San 
Francisco's  being  as  far  by  water  from  Liver- 
pool as  Sitka  is  from  New  York,  the  City 
of  the  Golden  Gate  will  be  brought  as 
near  to  Liverpool  as  New  York  now  is  to 
Bombay. 

When  every  one  believes  an  era  of  great  de- 
velopment is  coming,  and  squares  himself  to 
greet  it  and  to  profit  by  it,  nothing  can  stop 
its  approach.  And  what  a  getting  ready  for 
the  prosperity  that  is  coming  is  now  to  be 
found  on  the  West  Coasts  of  the  two  Americas ! 
These  preparations  are  not  in  the  shape  of  such 
a  tremendous  rise  of  values  as  to  discount 
the  future  for  a  generation,  but  rather  in  the 


FUTURE  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS     247 

shape  of  a  widespread  plan  to  be  ready  to  open 
up  the  latent  resources  of  these  regions  the 
minute  conditions  are  ripe.  It  gives  no  indi- 
cation of  being  an  era  of  speculation  on  things 
that  exist  to-day,  but  rather  it  promises  to  seek 
its  reward  in  the  development  of  latent  wealth. 
With  such  a  concerted,  united,  common-consent 
plan  for  reaping  the  benefits  of  the  canal,  there 
is  going  to  be  almost  an  unprecedented  demand 
for  labour  in  western  Pan-America.  There 
will  be  no  bubbles  of  speculation  to  burst,  but 
rich  tolls  of  industry  to  gather. 

Already  the  big  steamship  lines  are  planning 
to  take  advantage  of  the  situation.  They  will 
have  large  fleets  of  immigrant  carrying  ships, 
equipped  with  the  excellent  accommodations 
which  the  "  new "  steerage  provides,  ready 
to  carry  labourers  and  their  families  to  these 
new  fields  of  abundant  opportunities  for  work 
and  good  pay.  The  labour  centres  of  Europe 
are  watching  with  interest  the  approaching 
completion  of  the  Canal,  since  the  tide  of  im- 
migration that  will  set  through  it  will  mean 
not  only  better  wages  for  those  who  go,  but 
likewise  for  those  who  stay  behind.  The  cut- 
ting down  of  the  labour  supply  in  Europe  has 
consistently  helped  the  wage-earner  who  re- 
mained behind  to  get  a  better  wage  than  he 
could  command  before  his  brethren  answered 


248  THE  IMMIGRANT 

the  wanderlust  begotten  of  economic  condi- 
tions which  called  upon  them  to  take  up  their 
possessions  and  join  the  great  caravan  of  hu- 
manity bound  to  the  New  World. 

An  inkling  of  what  the  West  Coast  of  the 
Americas  may  be  able  ultimately  to  do  in  the 
way  of  furnishing  homes  for  a  new  population 
is  to  be  gathered  from  Salvador.  This  little 
country,  with  an  area  so  small  that  nineteen 
countries  like  it  could  be  tucked  away  within 
the  confines  of  the  single  state  of  California, 
has  a  population  of  1,707,000  souls.  In  other 
words,  while  California  to-day  has  a  popula- 
tion of  2,377,000,  according  to  the  Salva- 
dorean standard  it  could  support  some  forty 
million  people.  Any  one  who  has  travelled 
from  La  Libertad  to  San  Salvador,  and  from 
San  Salvador  via  Sonsonate  to  Acajutla  and 
Zacapa,  and  who  has  beheld  the  hundreds  of 
square  miles  taken  up  with  volcanic  moun- 
tains, knows  that  Salvador  has  no  greater  pro- 
portion of  arable  land  than  California.  Fur- 
thermore, having  seen  the  tropical  system  of 
agriculture  and  industry,  he  knows  that  Cali- 
fornia can  match  product  with  product  and  re- 
source with  resource.  The  Salvadoreans  are 
the  most  prosperous  people  of  the  West  Coast, 
in  spite  of  the  remarkable  density  of  popula- 
tion found  there. 


FUTURE  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS     249 

Duplicating  the  population  of  Salvador,  the 
other  countries  of  Central  America  could  find 
room  for  upward  of  thirty  million  souls  above 
their  present  population.  Mexico  could  fur- 
nish an  abiding-place  for  nearly  150,000,000 
additional  people.  Measured  according  to  the 
Salvadorean  standard,  the  Americas  ultimately 
could  accommodate  a  total  population  equiva- 
lent to  twice  the  estimated  population  of  the 
entire  earth  to-day.  Of  course,  such  a  time 
may  never  come  and  certainly  will  not  come  for 
many  centuries,  but  it  demonstrates  the  pos- 
sibilities of  the  West  Coast. 

It  seems  certain  that  the  opening  of  the 
Panama  Canal  will  give  new  truth  to  the  say- 
ing that  westward  the  course  of  empire  takes 
its  way.  But  that  age-long  tendency  of  the 
unceasing  drift  of  humanity  will  stop  with  the 
Pacific  shores  of  the  Americas,  for  beyond 
that  lies  Asia,  where  the  movement  began,  and 
where  there  is  no  room  for  new  immigration. 
The  indications  all  point  to  the  Americas  and 
Australia  as  the  regions  to  which  the  footsteps 
of  the  immigrant  will  lead  for  at  least  a  cen- 
tury more.  Asia  will  be  shut  up  within  her- 
self, neither  offering  her  hospitality  to  immi- 
grant races,  nor  being  offered  that  of  the  other 
continents. 

After  all  the  resistless  tides  of  humanity 


250  THE  IMMIGRANT 

have  swept  to  and  fro  over  the  bosom  of  the 
oceans  and  over  the  lands  of  the  earth  in 
search  of  new  worlds  of  economic  advantage 
to  conquer,  there  yet  may  come  a  time  when 
they  will  fold  their  tents  and  march  back  to 
the  irrigation  ditches  from  which  civilization 
sprang.  Once  the  earth's  supply  of  coal  is 
exhausted  man  will  be  put  to  it  to  find  power 
to  turn  the  wheels  of  the  world's  industries. 
The  capital  that  old  Sol  stored  up  in  the  earth 
through  millions  of  years  of  shining,  exhausted, 
some  means  then  must  be  found  to  replenish 
the  supply.  And  only  one  means  thereafter 
can  science  see  to-day — the  solar  engine,  driven 
by  the  direct  rays  of  the  sun.  The  solar  engine 
can  do  its  work  steadfastly  and  efficiently  only 
under  a  hot  sun  and  permanently  cloudless 
sky.  So  industry  will  be  driven  to  the  sun- 
burnt waterfronts  of  the  earth.  There  man 
will  irrigate  his  fields,  run  his  factories,  drive 
his  railroad  trains,  operate  his  ships,  cool  his 
houses,  freeze  his  ice,  and  do  all  of  the  thou- 
sand things  that  civilization  demands,  with  the 
heat  of  the  sun.  He  will  be  independent  of  the 
seasons,  for  there  is  but  one ;  he  will  not  have 
to  bother  about  the  rainfall,  for  he  will  distill 
his  water  and  irrigate  his  fields  from  the  sea. 
He  will  not  care  about  the  weather,  for  he  will 


FUTURE  HUMAN  MIGRATIONS     251 

be  largely  indoors  and  all  buildings  will  be 
cooled  by  the  same  power  that  burns  the  sands 
of  the  desert.  Fanciful?  But  none  the  less 
one  of  the  futures  to  which  the  drifting  tides 
of  humanity  may  be  sweeping. 


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